Biological psychiatry describes the discipline, biopsychiatry controversy describes the minor, but arguably significant, movement among certain mental health professionals that challenges the validity of biological psychiatry as a scientific discipline. In the same manner we have articles on climate change denial and climate change, Al Gore and Al Gore controversies, splitting off the reliably documented discussion and/or criticism of something from the article describing said thing is not a POV-fork unless it promotes the criticism rather than describe it. Moreover, the creation of this article was a consensus outcome from a RfAr on this very subject (in which, for full disclosure, I was a participant on the "pro-psychiatry" side - so i'm hardly an advocate of this particular article). The subject of the article is a minority viewpoint (as is made clear in the lead), so its not undue weight to focus on such a viewpoint. However, if you consider the minority viewpoint to lack significance, XfD exists for this very reason. Why don't you nominate and let the community decide? Otherwise, what specifically is NPOV about it, there appears to be a significant amount of sourcing, the the language appears relatively neutral to me. Rockpocket 07:51, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

NPOV says that the article should fairly represent all significant viewpoints that have been published by a reliable source, and should do so in proportion to the prominence of each. Now an important qualification: Articles that compare views should not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views, and may not include tiny-minority views at all. For example, the article on the Earth only very briefly refers to the Flat Earth notion, a view of a distinct minority.

We should not attempt to represent a dispute as if a view held by a small minority deserved as much attention as a majority view. Views that are held by a tiny minority should not be represented except in articles devoted to those views. To give undue weight to a significant-minority view, or to include a tiny-minority view, might be misleading as to the shape of the dispute. Wikipedia aims to present competing views in proportion to their representation among experts on the subject, or among the concerned parties. This applies not only to article text, but to images, external links, categories, and all other material as well.

Undue weight applies to more than just viewpoints. Just as giving undue weight to a viewpoint is not neutral, so is giving undue weight to other verifiable and sourced statements. An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject, but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. Note that undue weight can be given in several ways, including, but not limited to, depth of detail, quantity of text, prominence of placement, and juxtaposition of statements.

Minority views can receive attention on pages specifically devoted to them—Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia. But on such pages, though a view may be spelled out in great detail, it must make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint, and must not reflect an attempt to rewrite majority-view content strictly from the perspective of the minority view.

If a viewpoint is in the majority, then it should be easy to substantiate it with reference to commonly accepted reference texts;

If a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents;

If a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited) minority, it does not belong in Wikipedia (except perhaps in some ancillary article) regardless of whether it is true or not; and regardless of whether you can prove it or not.

If you are able to prove something that few or none currently believe, Wikipedia is not the place to premiere such a proof. Once a proof has been presented and discussed elsewhere, however, it may be referenced. See: Wikipedia:No original research and Wikipedia:Verifiability.

This article clearly give a minority view, much more and much more detailed a description as the majority (which it fails to mention entirely). HrafnTalkStalk 09:41, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

I would also point out that this, wholly anti-psychiatry, article is 82% of the size of Biological psychiatry (which already includes a criticism section) -- so even if the two articles were looked at collectively (which I don't think is permitted under WP:UNDUE) it would be giving the anti-psychiatry side massive undue weight. HrafnTalkStalk 10:01, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

I'm familiar with WP:UNDUE, thank you, as I spent a long time discussing its relevance to this very issue at the ArbCom I mentioned. Your comparison in size between the two articles is not relevant. We don't delete or restrict one informative article because an alternative one is not fully developed. So that someone has spent more time expanding one article is neither here not there. Biopsychiatry describes the discipline, Biopsychiatry controversy describes the minority view that the discipline is controversial. They are two different articles with two different subjects - facing them off against each other as "giving one side more weight" is misunderstanding that. These articles are not about "sides", they are about giving accurate coverage of two related but different subjects. Nowhere in this article does it mislead the reader to the relative popularity of this "controversy" in comparison to standard medical practice, i.e.:

"The debate is focused on criticism of mainstream psychiatric thinking, proposed by a vocal lobby of psychiatrists and scientists who are at present in the minority"

"Modern brain imaging techniques, PET, MRI and CT scans are widely used in the medical profession."

So the real question about the appropriateness of this article is: is the "controversy" notable enough for an article of its own? If it is, then I see little wrong with the general content as it stands (apart from some weasel words here and there). There is certainly an argument that it isn't significant enough, though it isn't one I personally ascribe to. If that is the angle you are going for, then AfD is the way forward. Otherwise I'm not entirely clear what you want. If you would like more about the bio-psychiatrists views on the controversy then feel free to add it (though they don't see it is a controversy, so I'm not sure they have a lot to say on the subject). Rockpocket 06:44, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

Rockpocket, you are clearly not familiar with WP:UNDUE, if you think that this article giving the minority (anti-psychiatry) viewpoint more coverage than the majority (pro-psychiatry) viewpoint is acceptable. A "controversy" requires at least two viewpoints. Why is only one viewpoint, and the minority viewpoint at that, given significant coverage by this article?' I have no "angle" -- it has been you who has repeatedly raised the issue of AfD (both here and on my talkpage). I have merely tagged a grossly POV article, and (for reasons of civility) written a short note explaining why. You have yourself admitted (on my talkpage) that this article was created as a "compromise" between the majority of editors of Biological psychiatry, and an editor who was pushing an anti-psychiatry POV there. I assume therefore that the "angle" is yours. I don't know if it is to protect this compromise (which is in fact a POV-fork in violation of wikipedia policy) from critical scrutiny, to get somebody unconnected with Biological psychiatry to nominate this article for deletion (thus getting rid of it without violating the compromise), or what. To be honest, I'm not really interested. This article is in POV, I've tagged it as such, and so (beyond keeping half an eye on it in the future) I'm done here. HrafnTalkStalk 09:13, 18 October 2007 (UTC)

I obviously disagree. However, I'm sure there are many more articles that will greatly benefit form your "template and move on" contributions, so I wouldn't want to hold your good work back. Good luck with that. Rockpocket 02:30, 19 October 2007 (UTC)

Freud edit

Notwithstanding the sloppy scholarship of many psychiatric historians, it is important to remember that Sigmund Freud was not a psychiatrist. In late nineteenth-century Europe, the term "psychiatrist" meant a physician working in the public mental hospital system. Because Jews were barred from employment in state bureaucracies, they could not be psychiatrists and hence could not force people to be their unwilling patients.

Biomarkers for PTSD

"Only two of them, Post-traumatic stress disorder and Dissociative identity disorder are thought to be psychogenic or caused by traumatic experiences."

In fact, there are piles of data on biomarkers for PTSD. The most well supported finding is that individuals with PTSD have lower plasma cortisol levels after traumatization and other HPA axis modifications ([1],[2]). Evidence suggests that lower cortisol (or more precisely, enhanced glucocorticoid receptor sensitivity, an effect of which is lowered cortisol) isn't merely a result of developing PTSD, but a predisposing factor ([3],[4]). There also seems to be progress in identifying genes associated with increased PTSD risk (for instance [5]), although this is at an earlyish stage. It isn't even quite accurate to say that PTSD is "caused" by traumatic experiences, since only a minority of individuals exposed to trauma actually develop PTSD([6]). Of course I'm not saying that trauma isn't necessary for PTSD -- it simply isn't sufficient, and so the implication that PTSD is entirely psychogenic is misleading at best. It's my opinion that these and other data make a pretty compelling case, but regardless it certainly isn't "thought" by most psychiatrists that PTSD doesn't have any biological correlates. I therefore removed PTSD from this sentence. 152.130.6.130 (talk) 16:35, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

PS - Now that I look at it again, the whole statement seems like nonsense to me. It was inaccurate to imply that PTSD is wholly psychogenic; just so, the statement now implies that psychiatrists think that disorders other than DID are wholly somatic, when in fact practically no one believes this for most disorders. There are exceptions (for instance Down syndrome), but for the most part practically all psychiatrists acknowledge important roles for environmental factors even in highly heritable diseases like schizophrenia or Tourette syndrome. The section on genetics seems to acknowledge this fact: "According to biopsychiatry, genetic and environmental factors both appear to be of vital importance in determining mental state and therefore certain genetic factors can predispose [rather than "cause"] people to particular mental illnesses" (my emphasis). The article could use a lot more of this kind of nuance. As it is, the "biopsychiatrists" being assailed are straw men. 152.130.6.130 (talk) 16:59, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

I believe you are right to be dissatisfied with trying to force this (and many other other conditions) into either mind or body but... and so here are my thoughts.

Biomarkers are just chemical entities that are not usually present, they can be either causative or an artefact of a condition. As for 'pre-disposition' your view is almost like the police saying “No, your jewellery did not disappear because you had burglars, but because you always leave your doors and windows open”

Why "bio-psychiatrists" seem to be undergoing the straw man treatment is down to them really. The biochemistry that goes on at and around the synapse is only some twenty percent of any nerve cell chemistry. Errors with the remaining 80% also can effect the performance of the synapse but this fact ('fact' in the proper sense of the word) is completely ignored for the purposes of treatment -as though it is completely unimportant. Also, it is not just the genetics but how genes switch other genes off and on. How they do this and and what in the internal and external environment affect good bodily and mental functioning is only just being explored. For bio-psychiatry to claim to be able to explain it all, it has to come up with evermore increasingly complex explanations, where as science always searches out the simplest, using Occam's Razor. (It is important to remember psychiatry is simply a discipline of medicine and not a science). As with other beliefs and practises, these bio-psychiatric views will be held firmly and defended vigorously by those that practise this art until science finally displaces it with a good and testable theories.

Lastly, it is beginning to appear that these pre-dispositions have survived and not been breed out of the human race because they are useful. (It is just that certain combinations of good genes and good 'gene expressions' make the normal enjoyment of life difficult or impossible). It has stuck me whilst talking to people who are suffering from PTSD that they would have been very valuable in a primitive society for warning the rest of the tribe against getting into the same terrifying situation. We should stop trying to mess with their chemistry and listen to those that suffer PTSD a bit more. I reversed your edit because PTSD is not caused by trauma per se, but an experience that has to happen with certain conditions in place. In my book that is due to neurological architecture working as it is designed to work. So it was easier to revert. --Aspro (talk) 21:39, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Still, another NPOV dispute...

My wiki-vacation was momentarily interrumpted when I received an e-mail of something going astray re minority vs. majority views and violation of —oh irony!— the WP policy on unde weight (see talk:Satanic ritual abuse for details).

Since my wiki-break I had not seen what happened in the articles I started or contributed —until today. I was surprised to see that both this article and Antipsychiatry have been tagged. No worry of a storm coming from me this time! I am not interested in wikilawyering with User:Hrafn about undue weigh ("ironic" I wrote above because in the Satanic ritual abuse article that broke my wiki-vacation I argue on the majority side!). But it’s sad to see that the articles in which I invested such amount of time have been tagged. This time I will leave the removal of the tags to other editors when, perhaps in the near future, this wikilawyering discussion reaches consensus from still other editors.

On the other hand, I would think it very unwise to nominate this article for deletion. The controversy is notable, if not within psychiatry itself, it’s is sufficiently notable among social workers, psychologists and some MDs. It’s also notable among psychiatric survivors and even among hundreds if not thousands of families who are confused about the biopsychiatry controversy of having millions (literally millions) of kids on Ritalin and other psychiatric drugs. Deleting an article that describes, not promotes, the theoretical basis of the controversy would be a great disservice to the WP readership.

Given that this article continues to give almost no weight to the majority pro-psychiatry viewpoint in this 'controversy', I see no immediate prospect of it ceasing to violate WP:UNDUE, and thus WP:NPOV, and losing its well-earned POV-tag, any time soon. The anonymous and amorphous "social workers, psychologists and some MDs ... psychiatric survivors and even among hundreds if not thousands of families" that you cite are not reliable sources for the purposes of establishing notability. I was not pressing for an AfD -- that was Rockpocket's idea throughout. HrafnTalkStalk 05:33, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Whatever. But whose interpretation of WP:UNDUE and WP:NPOV is the right one —yours or Rockpocket’s— is for the community to decide.

Oh, yes!: You say in your talk pay that I walk like a duck and quack like a duck. You won’t believe this but one of the reasons that moved me to study those academics who say that biopsychiatry is pseudoscientific were my readings of the skeptical literature and especially the CSICOP writers (I even published a skeptical article about the Bélmez faces in Skeptical Inquirer: a case that I helped to debunk.) I know CSICOPers personally and consider them some sort of mentors. Also, the fact that many sane and healthy children have been diagnosed with ADHD is what drives many professionals to question the validity of biopsychiatry: the only medical specialty witout biomarkers. I trust you wouldn’t say that Karl Popper is a scientific quack? Well, he exchanged some letters with Tom Szasz dismissing psychiatry.

But all of this is besides the point. I won’t discuss policy here. Even lawyers in the real world don’t agree when interpreting the law. What we need here is more consensus as to whose interpretation of WP:UNDUE and WP:NPOV is the right one.

Rockpocket didn't "interpret" WP:UNDUE, he merely tied himself in knots trying to pretend that this policy doesn't apply to this article (as if simply putting the word "controversy" in its title suspends this policy). Every word you have uttered here has demonstrated that you are only interested in seeing that the anti-Biopsychiatry side is represented. Biopsychiatry may be pseudoscience, but unless and until you can demonstrate that this is the overwhelming majority viewpoint, this article MUST give due weight to the viewpoint that Biopsychiatry is scientific for it to meet WP:NPOV. Any other "interpretation" is simply tendentious. HrafnTalkStalk 09:30, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Comment:

Perhaps an explanation of some of the basics will help clear the confusion but first I'll digress:

Although more and more schools, are shaving great chunks off of the time spent on teaching students about the history of the pursuit of knowledge, influential figures like Francis Bacon etc., and the way knowledge accumulates and is organised, before they get down to learning about the sciences etc. This skimping obviously does not bode well for original purpose behind general education -one of which is to work things out for oneself 'correctly' . High pass rate in exams does not necessarily mean the student has had time to developed and hone those qualities normally associated with a good education.
Therefore, perhaps this below will clear up some of the confusion; so here we go...

Off the top of my head: The practice of medicine is divided up into some two dozen disciplines.

There are approximately twice that number and more of sub-disciplines.

One of those disciplines is Psychiatry; no more no less – it simply a discipline and not a science -as yet.

If one goes to (or gets brought before) a psychiatrist for treatment he will practice his 'Art' upon you - under the licence he has been granted.

The licence is for to Practice the Art of Psychiatry -not to perform science.

It is up to those involved in any 'Art' to prove it has become a science – not the other way around.

Thus, any pretence to a therapy being science is (so far) pseudo-science in this field.

On the question of undue weight:

This article is a 'critique' of a discipline and of some of its practices, statements and positions and so forth. As such 'it' like other critiques can, and is growing; it is not bound, by that which it passes comment upon. Indeed, how is ignorance overcome, other by crowding it out by real world observations? If it where to be otherwise, then growth of the general body of knowledge would cease, and stagnation would follow -as history has shown more than once.

The 'larger body of writings' about psychiatry is either about the practice of this art by people earning a living in this field or papers produced by an industry that is simply trying to sell its products like any other human industry. As such -- and by itself -- this does no constitute a demonstration of 'value' and 'benefit' of anything in a scientific sense -although this is often how it is dressed up to appear. Under the rules of argument, to confuse this body of work in its entirety and hold it up for comparison by 'weight' is to introduce a logical fallacy. Indeed, it could be argued that this article is far too short if it is to balance 'weight' as it is the sub-discipline in this case which is so lacking.

These comments apply not only to psychiatry but to the practice and marketing of any other 'Art'.

Obviously, this is rather a superficial explanation but this is supposed to be a talk page and yet more words are appearing here, than actual text to the article in question.--Aspro (talk) 15:28, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Aspro: your response on WP:UNDUE appears to amount to a claim that (1) WP:UNDUE doesn't apply because it is a "critique" and (2) because the majority is self-serving. There are a number of problems with this view. (1) WP:UNDUE gives no exception for "critiques", it applies to all articles; (2) nor does it give an exception for where the majority are the 'black-hats'; (3) in any case this article is not entitled "critique of biopsychiatry" but "biopsychiatry controversy" -- therefore it should offer due weight to both sides of this controversy (biopsychiatry's critiques of anti-biopsychiatry's arguments, as well as anti-biopsychiatry's critiques of biopsychiatry) -- not just to Cesar Tort's favoured side, as it does now. HrafnTalkStalk 16:04, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Originally I intended another title for this article. But User:Joema insisted in the "controversy" title. Maybe I should have stick to the other title I had in mind? At any event, we need consensus from other editors about how to interpret policy. There are other WP articles that describe the minority view and are not pov-tagged. Cesar Tort 18:39, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Meanwhile I would recommend to replace your tag for another one, perhaps {{POV-check}}. Is that fair enough? —Cesar Tort 20:38, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

An article should not give undue weight to any aspects of the subject, but should strive to treat each aspect with a weight appropriate to its significance to the subject. Note that undue weight can be given in several ways, including, but not limited to, depth of detail, quantity of text, prominence of placement, and juxtaposition of statements.[Emphasis mine]

In the context of this article, the "majority" view is pro-biopsychiatry (as this is the viewpoint of the medical establishment), the anti-biopsychiatry is the minority.

The article is approx 22k long. The one paragraph that Rockpocket has identified as being pro-biopsychiatry (although my opinion is that it offers a very pallid defence) is approximately 1k long.

I therefore propose progressively eliminating anti-biopsychiatry material until the "quantity of text" reflects its minority status, as clearly envisaged by this policy.

Minority views can receive attention on pages specifically devoted to them—Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia. But on such pages, though a view may be spelled out in great detail, it must make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint, and must not reflect an attempt to rewrite majority-view content strictly from the perspective of the minority view.

If you have a concern, then progressively adding pro-biopsychiatry material until there is "appropriate reference" to its majority status, as clearly envisaged by this policy, is the way forward. Removing sourced content because, in your opinion, there is a lack of balancing content is reductive. Not the way to build comprehensive and quality coverage of a subject. Rockpocket 18:09, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Rockpocket: (1) This article is not "specifically devoted" to the minority view, it is "devoted" to the "controversy", which encompasses both majority and minority viewpoints. (2) Even were it so "specifically devoted", this does not alleviate the fact that this article does not "make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint" (a viewpoint that it barely, and then pallidly, mentions at all). Your proposed solution is simply to allow WP:UNDUE to be held hostage to any POV-warrior with more time/a bigger library than those attempting to balance the article. This is not "clearly envisaged by the policy" -- you are simply projecting your own wishes onto it. I see no purpose in spending a large amount of time boning up on this subject simply to try to counter Cesar Tort's well-established POV-crusade. HrafnTalkStalk 06:53, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Interesting that there are now at last 3 editors disagreeing with your "solution" (including two administrators), yet you seem unwilling to accept any position other than your own. The crucial thing you appear to ignore is that an a "controversy" can exist because a minority of people disagree with an established position. There is no controversy from the majority viewpoint, therefore the controversy is a consequence of the minority viewpoint and this is the page devoted to it. I could turn you argument around and say that your solution would simply be a fop to a POV warrior like yourself who can't be bothered to source material to support your own position, so simply wishes to remove anything they disagree with. That however, is lacking in good faith. Accusing others of POV-pushing when you have near zero experience of edits is unhelpful. If you "see no purpose in spending a large amount of time boning up on this subject" then fine, no-one is asking you to. But if you are unwilling to be constructive in addressing the concerns you see, and there is a sufficient number of editors in good standing what disagree with your interpretation, then they tags you added way well get removed. Rockpocket 18:20, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

<unindent> Rockpocket, this is because these editors have been repeatedly tap-dancing around WP:UNDUE rather than addressing it (as I have documented above). If, as you say, " There is no controversy from the majority viewpoint" then:

Your repeated exhortations for me to write content on this controversy from this viewpoint have been blatantly dishonest (as there is clearly nothing to write).

The very title of this article is a NPOV violation, as it assumes the existence of a controversy that the majority denies.

In any case, as I have already pointed out above, "even were it so 'specifically devoted', this does not alleviate the fact that this article does not 'make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint' (a viewpoint that it barely, and then pallidly, mentions at all)."

If the minority viewpoint is so small that it can't even get the majority to acknowledge its existence, it is probably too small to be worthy of its own article & should be merged back into biopsychiatry.

I don't agree/disagree with either viewpoint, I have no axe to grind beyond (1) a desire to see WP:UNDUE enforced (at least approximately) and (2) to stop POV-warriors from this area from making badly-substantiated edits to pseudoscience claiming that psychiatry is pseudoscientific (it may be so, but they have yet to provide any decent substantiation of the claim). HrafnTalkStalk 03:12, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

There is nothing wrong with the bulk of the text of this article being criticism of biopsychiatry, it just needs to be clear where the consensus on this issues lie. It must be properly mentioned and referenced to. Voice-of-All 21:04, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

No -- that there is something wrong with this is explicitly stated in WP:UNDUE. HrafnTalkStalk 06:53, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

Recent edits

Rather than simply remove anti-biopsychiatry content wholesale in order to attempt to create some balance between viewpoints, I have been removing material that is reliant on dodgy sources, takes sources out of context, is in violation of WP:UNDUEirrespective of the wider balance of the article, etc -- i.e. that needed to be removed anyway, whether there was an overall balance problem or not. HrafnTalkStalk 05:17, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

OK, generally fine (this article was filled with a lot of cruft), but could you explain this[7] a bit more. I'm not sure what was wrong with that. Voice-of-All 07:20, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

Actually a lot of the stuff there did violate WP:NPOV, but not because "the page favored one side" but because there where a lot people being mentioned that were either totally unmentionable or were talking about something unrelated to the topic. Voice-of-All 07:23, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

The full paragraph was:

Research has shown that serious neurobiological disorders such as schizophrenia reveal reproducible abnormalities of brain structure (such as ventricular enlargement) and function. Compelling evidence exists that disorders including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and autism to name a few have a strong genetic component. Still, brain science has not advanced to the point where scientists or clinicians can point to readily discernible pathologic lesions or genetic abnormalities that in and of themselves serve as reliable or predictive biomarkers of a given mental disorder or mental disorders as a group. Ultimately, no gross anatomical lesion such as a tumor may ever be found; rather, mental disorders will likely be proven to represent disorders of intercellular communication; or of disrupted neural circuitry. Research already has elucidated some of the mechanisms of action of medications that are effective for depression, schizophrenia, anxiety, attention deficit, and cognitive disorders such as Alzheimer's disease. These medications clearly exert influence on specific neurotransmitters, naturally occurring brain chemicals that effect, or regulate, communication between neurons in regions of the brain that control mood, complex reasoning, anxiety, and cognition. In 1970, The Nobel Prize was awarded to Julius Axelrod, Ph.D., of the National Institute of Mental Health, for his discovery of how anti-depressant medications regulate the availability of neurotransmitters such as norepinephrine in the synapses, or gaps, between nerve cells.

The quoted portions...

Brain science has not advanced to the point where scientists or clinicians can point to readily discernible pathologic lesions or genetic abnormalities that in and of themselves serve as reliable or predictive biomarkers of a given mental disorder or mental disorders as a group […]. Mental disorders will likely be proven to represent disorders of intracellular communication; or of disrupted neural circuitry

...make the progress to date seem far more tentitive and speculative than the full text reveals. HrafnTalkStalk 08:54, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

fixing endnotes

I don't understand why some references I just added don't appear in the endontes section (they are all visible though in "show changes"). Cesar Tort 22:56, 22 December 2007 (UTC)

The problem appears to be that you keep sticking <ref name=""> tags in them, which is confusing the parsing software into believing that they're all references to the same citation. Please learn correct use of wiki-markup. HrafnTalkStalk 03:24, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Andreasen citation

Cesar removed a {{Request quotation}} template which states "Quotation from source requested on talk page to verify interpretation of source" (my emphasis), and replaced it with a very short, and thus context-less, quote in the article. This lack of context makes it useless for verifying interpretation. I am therefore requesting a fuller quote (the paragraph it's taken from + one paragraph either side), here, to allow us sufficient context to evaluate this rather extraordinary-seeming claim. HrafnTalkStalk 04:03, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Andreasen recognizes in her 2001 book that psychiatry still has no biomarkers at hand. However, throughout her book it's clear that she has enormous faith that they will find the markers in the future. What exactly do you want me to quote? Cesar Tort 04:43, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

"I am therefore requesting a fuller quote (the paragraph it's taken from + one paragraph either side)" HrafnTalkStalk 05:22, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Hrafn's removals

Hrafn: I think you have removed more than enough —almost the entire article!

In Edit summary you state: "Rm: section no longer contains any evidence directly purporting a lack of biomarkers, only reference to biomarkers is from a journalist".

Gerard Heinze, the director of what may be called the Mexican National Institute of Mental Health, told me, in his very labs, that what those tests measure "are not biological markers", and he was speaking for the whole profesión. Just because I cannot find the exact reference doesn’t mean that the statement “no biomarkers” is untrue.

WP:V: "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth." (emphasis in original) Conversations you have had, unless reported in a WP:RS are WP:OR. HrafnTalkStalk 05:20, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Also, the "extraordinary claims require extraordinary sources" is a good guideline, not WP policy. And the Ramón de la Fuente source which was removed is considered a most reliable source in Mexico: de la Fuente was a well-known, extremely orthodox psychiatrist in the academia, with lots of scholarly publications.

Also, you stated in edit summary when removing Alvin Pam’s reference: "Per WP:UNDUE "attempt to rewrite majority-view content strictly from the perspective of the minority view" & prob WP:RS#Extremist sources". In think that’s wrong since, before publishing his paper in a book, Pam publisher it in the very reliable source ACTA PSYCHIATRICA SCANDINAVICA.

I did not remove Pam's reference using that edit-summary, only Read & Szasz (in different edits) -- take a closer look at the dif. HrafnTalkStalk 05:20, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

There are more questionable removals but I don’t have much time to discuss.

If the article remains thus vandalized I would favor that the pov tag remains: the article as it stands reflects the view of those who want to silence the critics.

Sorry, but these removals are necessary, according to WP:V, WP:RS and other polices, quite separate from the overall balance issue under WP:UNDUE that led me to place the POV-tag on the article, as I have already stated in the section above. HrafnTalkStalk 05:20, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Good bye!

The full reference I mentioned above is: Pam, Alvin (1990). "A critique of the scientific status of biological psychiatry", Acta Psychiatricia Scandinavica 82, (Suppl. 362), pages 1-35. Hrafn did remove some of Pam’s sentences; and I never, ever said that what Heinze told me was a Reliable Source (RS): I was merely trying to convey the point, in this talk page, that finding a RS takes some time. But I am done here. I have no patience at all to deal with this sort of massive deletions and vandalism under the excuse of a specious interpretation of NPOV’s undue weight policy. I will now un-watch this article and hope that other editors will reinsert, at least, some of the vandalized material by Hrafn as well as finding the proper sources. Meanwhile leave the pov tag, please. The tag now reflects Hrafn’s hijack of this article as well as his specious interpretation of undue weight. Good bye. I won’t edit this page ever again :) —Cesar Tort 06:32, 23 December 2007 (UTC)

Per Pam, either cite difs or stop whining. I definitely didn't do it in either of the edits that used the edit-summary you cited above, and can find no evidence that I did this in some other edit.

You were citing your conversation with Heinze as a rationale for leaving "lack of biomarkers" in without any other WP:RS to support this claim, thus you were effectively claiming it as a WP:RS.

That you consider removal of blatantly partisan minority sources employed for opinions attributed to the majority, removal of quotes out of context and correction of gross misrepresentations of sources as "vandalism" pretty clearly speaks to your attitude to WP:NPOV.

Note that a tag cannot persist for long without some active dispute, so a hiatus in editing will result in tag removal. Voice-of-All 01:44, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

3rd party sources

Of the 14 citations listed in the article, 6 are to anti-Biopsychiatry advocates and the remainder are to specific research findings by the Biopsychiatric community.

There are no secondary (per WP:PSTS) or third party/independent sources. The latter is problematical as per WP:NOTE: "A topic is presumed to be notable if it has received significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject." Lacking reliable independent sources there is no presumption of notability and the article may be subject to merger, redirection or deletion. HrafnTalkStalk 13:40, 31 December 2007 (UTC)

If you have followed the development of psychiatry you would have noticed that in certain parts of the world the anti-psychiatric stance is a growing body and not a tiny minority. If you read any magazine on mental health you will notice that articles on the bio-psychiatry controversy are dominated by people skeptical of psychiatry. An article which claims that bio-psychiatry is a well founded science and constitutes a majority view would be outright wrong. I suggest you read up on the topic before editing, and perhaps you can find any references that supports your idea. You will find that only psychiatrists who are personally involved will support it. Patients, survivors, psychologists, etc, you'll find have experiences that are quite a different one. This debate is not new and not controversial. It is only that there is a widespread misunderstanding that psychiatrists have anything well-founded to say about mental health, whilst history will tell you that this is just a systemic artifact. For every article that claims biomarkers in for example schizophenia, you will find science that tells that these biomarkers are caused by medicine instituted by psychiatric medicines. So, by making the error of claiming that psychiatry is "mainstream science" you pollute the article with political POV. This is like writing an article on Communism and writing it from a american majority view hence inadverdantly making the article POV and non-global. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 01:41, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for that lengthy WP:SOAPBOX rant in support of the WP:TRUTH of your noble fight. Please read WP:NOTE. If you cannot provide references beyond anti-biopsychiatry advocates, i.e. to third party sources, you cannot establish that this topic is notable. HrafnTalkStalk 01:59, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, that is what I claim; you won't find any good 3rd party sources that will be pro-biopsychiatry. If you don't think the bio-psychiatry controvesy is non-notable then you really just display ignorance about the topic and shouldn't really be editing the topic. To me it seems you're just using the chance to push your opinion into the article because the reality provokes you. :) I feel this is abusing the policies --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 02:31, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

To be a bit more specific, I claim that common sense shows that notability is clear given the huge array of things written about biopsychiatry. The primary sources are for content, and WP:NOTE does not direct content. The name "Biopsychiatry controversy" tho is an invention of the original article author (I think) and could be up to discussion, but the existence of an on-going debate can be told by a tiny dose of common sense. I think you rather should focus on finding better primary/secondary sources than to sow doubt about the article. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 02:56, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Benjaminbruheim: I don't give a pair of fetid dingo's kidneys about what you "claim" I am only interested in what you can substantiate from reliable sources. I likewise don't give a toss whether any third party sources view the pro or anti side more favourably (as long as they are sufficiently non-partisan to be legitimately "third party"), only that such reliable third party sources can be verified to exist. For myself, I am sceptical of both sides, so have no "opinion" to "push". HrafnTalkStalk 03:00, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Give some sources rather than just state "it is obvious". I don't buy that. Most of what I've read, and what is currently cited, either a) points out problems in junk pharama ads (even PhDs criticize those), b) gives anecdotes of junk practitioners (like people who say being depression => simple chemical imbalance), c) criticizes the popular media and folk explanations (like ADHD/depression is a discrete disease identifiable by FMRIs and such), or d) goes into some huge nonsense conspiracy rant (Baughman, Breggin, CCHR, Scientology). The last group is not taken seriously anywhere, and the others are not really talking about biopsychiatry and the relevant journals. Voice-of-All 03:25, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

CCHR and Breggin are not bed fellows. In fact, since Breggin helped his wife Ginger to get out from the cult, Scientology, the scientologists do not mention any of Breggin’s works; not even as endnotes! Breggin and his wife have been “disconnected” by the church. Generally speaking, secular critics of psychiatry are no friends of CCHR. I for one wrote a searing exposé (in Spanish) of both Scientology and CCHR.[8] —Cesar Tort 07:20, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

I pointed out that the name of the article might not be precise, but the existence of an on-going attack on psychiatry because of its lack of biomarkers has been going on for a long while. The number of articles, support groups, websites and zines dedicated to the topic should make it clear there is an on-going debate. And I find it odd that one would require a meta-article discussing the discussion to settle wether the discussion exists. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Benjaminbruheim (talk • contribs) 03:48, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

What flood of sites? By who? The CCHR, scientology, blogs, some anonymous person? I don't give a rat's ass for that and neither does Wikipedia. Voice-of-All 03:52, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

As I have noted previously, if you consider it non-notable, then nominate it for deletion and let the community decide. Discussing alternative interpretations of policy is unlikely to resolve this. Rockpocket 03:01, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Why should I?template:notability states "If notability cannot be established, the article is more likely to be considered for redirection, merge or ultimately deletion, per Wikipedia:Guide to deletion."(my emphasis) There is no requirement to nominate it for anything implicit in questioning an article's notability, and nothing whatsoever to indicate that the ultimate course must be deletion. What you have spuriously and repeatedly "noted" has no basis whatsoever in wikipedia policy. So kindly stop noting it and address the specifics of WP:NOTE! HrafnTalkStalk 03:17, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I am pretty sure there are new articles and documentaries (one is on Frontline that I know of) that document this from a third party uninterested standpoint. Such sources can and should be added. Maybe there are scientific articles, who knows? But they don't have to be by science committees or in scientific journals to document a controversy (granted lacking such things lessons how seriously I'd personally take it). Voice-of-All 03:26, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

"Presumed" means objective evidence meets the criteria, without regard for the subjective personal judgments of editors.[1] Substantive coverage in reliable sources suggests that the subject is notable.[2]

"Significant coverage" means that sources address the subject directly in detail, and no original research is needed to extract the content. Significant coverage is more than trivial but may be less than exclusive.[3]

"Reliable" means sources need editorial integrity to allow verifiable evaluation of notability, per the reliable source guideline. Sources may encompass published works in all forms and media. Availability of secondary sources covering the subject are a good test for notability.[4]

"Sources,"[5] defined on Wikipedia as secondary sources, provide the most objective evidence of notability. The number and nature of reliable sources needed varies depending on the depth of coverage and quality of the sources. Multiple sources are generally preferred.[6]

"Independent of the subject" excludes works produced by those affiliated with the subject including (but not limited to): self-publicity, advertising, self-published material by the subject, autobiographies, press releases, etc.[7]

A topic for which this criterion is deemed to have been met by consensus, is usually worthy of notice, and satisfies one of the criteria for a stand-alone article in the encyclopedia. Verifiable facts and content not supported by multiple independent sources may be appropriate for inclusion within another article.

^Non-notability is a rebuttable presumption based only on a lack of suitable evidence of notability, which becomes moot once evidence is found. It is not possible to prove non-notability because that would require a negative proof.

^However, many subjects presumed to be notable may still not be worthy of inclusion – they fail What Wikipedia is not, or the coverage does not actually support notability when examined. For example, directories and databases, advertisements, announcements columns, minor news stories, and coverage with low levels of discrimination, are all examples of information that may not be evidence of notability for the purposes of article creation, despite their existence as reliable sources.

^Self-promotion, autobiography, and product placement are not the routes to having an encyclopedia article. The published works should be someone else writing independently about the topic. The barometer of notability is whether people independent of the topic itself (or of its manufacturer, creator, author, inventor, or vendor) have actually considered the topic notable enough that they have written and published non-trivial works of their own that focus upon it. Otherwise, someone could give their own topic as much notability as they want by simply expounding on it outside of Wikipedia, which would defeat the purpose of the concept. Also, neutral sources should exist in order to guarantee a neutral article can be written — self-promotion is not neutral (obviously), and self-published sources often are biased if even unintentionally: see Wikipedia:Autobiography and Wikipedia:Conflict of interest for discussion of neutrality concerns of such sources. Even non-promotional self-published sources, in the rare cases they may exist, are still not evidence of notability as they do not measure the attention a subject has recieved by the world at large.

^Including but not limited to newspapers, books and e-books, magazines, television and radio documentaries, reports by government agencies, scientific journals, etc. In the absence of multiple sources, it must be possible to verify that the source reflects a neutral point of view, is credible and provides sufficient detail for a comprehensive article.

^Lack of multiple sources suggests that the topic may be more suitable for inclusion in an article on a broader topic. Mere republications of a single source or news wire service do not always constitute multiple works. Several journals simultaneously publishing articles in the same geographic region about an occurrence, does not always constitute multiple works, especially when the authors are relying on the same sources, and merely restating the same information. Specifically, several journals publishing the same article within the same geographic region from a news wire service is not a multiplicity of works.

^Works produced by the subject, or those with a strong connection to them, are unlikely to be strong evidence of interest by the world at large. See also: Wikipedia:Conflict of interest for handling of such situations.

Please state (and substantiate) claims as to the notability of the Biopsychiatry controversy in terms of this policy, not the underlying WP:TRUTH of the anti-Biopsychiatry cause. HrafnTalkStalk 03:08, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

He will probably demand that it be in a psychiatric journal. Voice-of-All 03:27, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

This article is on the dangers of over-medication of drugs known to work individually ("drug cocktails") and misdiagnosis. I could not see anything in here that questioned a biological basis for psychiatry. As such it is at best tangential to the main controversy, and does little to aid in establishing notability. HrafnTalkStalk 03:43, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Right, this is the kind of stuff I mentioned in my reply to Benjaminbruheim. Voice-of-All 03:45, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, the best substantiation would be a review article on lack of progress in finding a biological basis for psychiatric illness in a prominent journal. But even an on-topic article in the mainstream press would go a long way to substantiating notability. HrafnTalkStalk 04:08, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

There is no requirement for you do do anything, just as there is no requirement for me to do anything. If you would rather propose it should be deleted as non-notable, but take no action to either precipitate that or address it, then you are free to do so. Personally, I find talking shops terminally boring and ultimately pointless in improving the encyclopaedia. So when you are past quoting policy to us and actually plan to do something productive about it, I'll be pleased to participate. Rockpocket 03:33, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

If there is no "requirement" for this then why do you keep demanding that I do so, and adding to the "talking shop" in the process? To nominate this article at this stage would seem to be precipitate. I tagged the article for lack of 3rd party sources some time back, and have just tagged it for notability on this basis. If no reliable third party sources are forthcoming in response to the tags, I intend to eventually nominate it for merger/redirect into either biological psychiatry#criticism or Anti-psychiatry. This is the measured, consensus-building approach. If you wish to nominate the article for deletion (now or in the future) instead, then you are free to do so. HrafnTalkStalk 03:51, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

As I dig into the subject from the angle outlined in the article, I do find that there is no problem finding primary sources regarding the topic. But these are usually in form of non-RS, although personally I find the shere size of the body non-trivial. Perhaps including the view of notable anti-psychiatrists (specialists preferably) even if they are from groups that are controversial. This is a systemic problem, because non-establishment are rarely featured in mainstream media. I started to find a couple of articles, but http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/content~content=a713679675~db=all - seems to be the only one which is about the lack of progress as Hrafn wanted. The others I find are about specific diseases. It is no problem finding mainstream admittance that schizophrenia or other specific illnesses lacks biomarkers. But you know the issue of proving a negative. At least it has been impossible for me to find any article that state there has been found biomarkers on any mental disease. The interesting property is that usually when a biomarker is found it is no longer a disease in the field of psychiatry. Besides, the term "biopsychiatry" is an american concept which lacks acceptance in the rest of the world (according to the psychiatric reviews I've found on norwegian sites). However, I do not have access to the article linked above but the abstract suggests biopsychiatry lacks progress. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 05:21, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

The article you cite is more closely related to the 'controversy' than the NYT article. However, both the Anti-psychiatry movement and the "users' movement" already have articles on wikipedia (I'm not sure where 'critical psychiatry' sits in all this). Does the article address what appears to be the core claim to the existence of a 'controversy' (as covered in the article's lead) -- whether the biological basis of psychiatry has been overblown, and legitimate alternate paradigms have been unreasonably marginalised? HrafnTalkStalk 05:47, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I do not have access to the article itself, but the abstract does indicate that biopsychiatry, the topic of the article, lacks progress. --~~

I see your point. But I feel this issue is seperate from anti-psychiatry for historical reasons. This is a subset of anti-psychiatry, or perhaps even a "modern incarnation" of it. While at the same time being a specific critcism of the whole notion of bio-psychiatry. The term "bio-psychiatry" has next to no use outside USA, and is usually these days used by opponents of psychiatry rather than proponents and professionals. So, perhaps this article should be renamed "Biopsychiatry Criticism" as it is an expansion of the criticism section in the Biopsychiatry article, which is already a lengthy article and mostly about the historical term anyway. The reality is biased against biopsychiatry since you will actually have big problems finding support for it. And of the little there is, the biomarkers are rarely bigger than 20% of the selection. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 06:30, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally, the article appears to be mostly concerned with the Biopsychosocial model. where does this model sit in terms of conventional psychiatry & antipsychiatry? HrafnTalkStalk 06:04, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I have no problem with qualified anti-psychiatry activists being included for their viewpoints (and not, as has happened previously, as sources for the history of mainstream psychiatry), as long as they are given WP:UNDUE weight. But this is an issue separate from notability. HrafnTalkStalk 05:53, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Notability part two

Well, it looks like the merge/disambiguation/template alternative is going down in flames, so we needs must return to the issue of notability. Benjaminbruheim has proposed a number of potential sources, which he believes are relevant. The crucial step now is to work them into the article as references (either for existing content, or for relevant new content), to verifiably demonstrate that this controversy exists as a notable cohesive topic -- as envisioned by the notability template, and also because sources that cannot underpin statements about a topic aren't really relevant for establishing the notability of the topic. HrafnTalkStalk 06:40, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

An alternative to a Biopsychiatry controversy article

An alternative to this article, with all its undue weight, sourcing and notability problems would be a Biopsychiatry controversy (or similar title) navigational template, covering the following:

How does this sound as an idea? HrafnTalkStalk 06:24, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Well I don't think this has undue weight problems, since it states the views as minority critic views. However, it does have serious notability, sourcing, and relevance problems. The more I read this the more it sounds like incoherent and unrelated topics mashed together. If you merged this article out, made it a disambiguation page, and made the template, I'd be fine with it. That would be lot less garbagey than it is now. Voice-of-All 06:30, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

The article is garbage because Hrafn has, without expertise on the topic, defiled the article. He has used RS to delete valuable statements, UNDUE to remove sections, and generally wiki-lawyered the hell out of what was a good article on the topic. The original article was a treatise on the different actors in the opposition to biopsychiatry as a concept. He was asked to add instead of removing, but he didn't listen. The article should "describe" not be "fair & balanced" and the lack of positive things to say about biopsychiatry is a bias in reality. Many of those who was termed bad sources was actually important actors in the debate! --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 07:19, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes I removed your 'WP:TRUTH', because it was neither WP:V, WP:RS nor WP:NPOV. It was an utter crap article, filled distortions, misrepresentations and partisan cruft. That you call this excision a "defilement" is indicative of your crusading viewpoint of the topic. HrafnTalkStalk 08:01, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I am very skeptical to this approach. I rather want this article renamed to "Biopsychiatry criticism" because that is what it is. It is that I find nobody that argues FOR biopsychiatry in such degree that it qualifies to a controversy. At the same time, a template about "anti-psychiatry" (as this term is more global) sounds like an independent good idea. I still think Biopsychosocial model is irrelevant. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 06:43, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Such an article would be against wikipedia guidelines (see template:criticism-section which recommends against criticism sections, let alone whole criticism articles). This article is already very close to being a WP:POVFORK of Biological psychiatry. A "Biopsychiatry criticism" article would be an explicit fork. HrafnTalkStalk 06:54, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

For an article in this area, whatever its name might be, to be a legitimate article and not just a POV-fork, it must cover all major viewpoints, not just Anti-Biopsychiatry (=Trauma model?) -- it must give due weight to the Biomedical & Biopsychosocial models as well. I think that a template would be far easier than attempting this complex balancing act. HrafnTalkStalk 07:12, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Biopsychosocial models have very little relevance these days in psychiatry, and is not notable in anti-psychiatry. The problem is that the issue is "below the radar" of major secondary sources, which is why this article was worthful in its previous state since it collected a lot of otherwise hard to find facts. Google is not your friend if you want to find good information on psychiatry since it is polluted by activists and medicine industry propoganda. Hence the best source for the topic and the debate is books and primary sources. Reviews, such as the one I linked above, are few and only valid for its point in time. If you were genuinely interested you would debate your edits before doing them. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 07:26, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

The problem is that anti-psychiatry appears to have very little notability in psychiatry either. And given the only scholarly article you have brought to light is squarely about Biopsychosocial models, it is a bit hard to justify an overview that excludes it. HrafnTalkStalk 08:05, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Putting this another way, criticism of biological psychiatry belongs in that article (to the extent that they are verifiably & reliably sourced, and given due weight). The only policy-compliant rationale to have this article is for an overview of the competing viewpoints. HrafnTalkStalk 07:22, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, in its current state I kinda agree. But the original article was too long to be merged with the parent article. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 07:26, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

The original article had a lot of content that shouldn't have been in any article, for reasons of WP:V, WP:RS, & WP:UNDUE. HrafnTalkStalk 07:54, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

You removed a lot of sourced references, and UNDUE was wrongly applied. It is your POV that says that UNDUE was not followed. To anyone familiar to the subject the weighing was correct. There is a bias in reality! You should rather have balanced it with the opposing POV, but you failed at that! And you removed tons of WP:V-content, especially those sourced in books. Even quotes by szasz which is a major component of the debate. Can you show me a single source where somebody is actually defending Biopsychiatry? --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 08:01, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I gave fairly detailed edit summaries for all my excisions, so you could easily have queried them at the time. They were typically very poorly sourced, using partisan minority sources to describe the majority position, or misrepresenting the sources. HrafnTalkStalk 08:12, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Also, the article is mid-grade on the psychology assessment scale. This topic is not controversial at all amongst specialists. If you showed the article in its previous state to a professional he would probably agree to everything. There was no POV in the article to start with. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 08:04, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Without prejudice about whether it should be merged or not in its current format, I would ask those discussing it to note that the last time a significant criticism section was added to the biological psychiatry article, it ended up at ArbCom. There was behaviour problems then too, admittedly, but there was also significant problems with the presence of a lengthy criticism section in the article. This article was a result of the outcome of that case, not as a POV fork but as an attempt to delineate article on a subject and on the discussion of a subject (evolution, Creation and Creation-evolution controversy was the paradigm discussed, I believe). I'm sure the editors involved here have sufficient editing experience and a superior grasp of policy to merge these articles appropriately (should that be the consensus), but it maybe work taking the discussion there, and the findings passed, into consideration. Rockpocket 08:05, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Hello Rockpocket, I agree with your handling on this debate. You are doing a great and a stimulating peace-making job here. Only a minor point. Remember that User:Jfdwolff, who argued on the pro-psychiatry side in the ArbCom Process, said in 2006 that the Creation-evolution controversy "is not analogous at all" to the biopsych controversy? —Cesar Tort 08:07, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Hello Cesar. Welcome back from your break. I had forgotten that. I tend to agree that the analogy breaks down when comparing the type of debate, but the principle - that "controversy" articles are not inherently POV-forks and are used to cover different material from parent articles - holds up pretty well. That was my understanding of Fred's proposal. It remains a open of debate whether this particular article is appropriate for a number of reasons, but I consider it important to note that this page was created in good faith as a creative remedy to a problem, rather than a willful attempt to POV fork (as has been suggested). Maybe it turned out that way, who knows, but having being present among the pages of discussions I am absolutely convinced that that was not the intention of you (its major contributor) or those that supported it. Recognizing that would be a good starting point in revisiting it now. Rockpocket 08:44, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Well, that makes it even more clear that there is little room for using UNDUE to remove content, especially the content that is WP:V. WP:NPOV then is just a technicality. Obviously there should be objections to the things said that has been objected to (and is sourced). Hrafn's editing has been detrimental since he has edited away a lot of WP:RS material. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Benjaminbruheim (talk • contribs) 08:12, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Rockpocket: I'm tired of you waving the ArbCom red flag at every opportunity:

ArbCom do no settle content disputes. If you want to act sufficiently childishly over at biological psychiatry that ArbCom has to be called in, then that's your problem.

We are only talking about 2 short paragraphs going into the criticism section.

If you feel that these paragraphs don't belong there, then you have the option of:

suggesting that they be moved elsewhere before the move; or

simply deleting them, stating a valid reason in an edit summary, after they've been moved there.

I have already given you a source on an article about the controversy in a major journal, and now you want to outright remove the article and state it is a controversy between Biopsychiatry, Biopsychosocial and the Trauma model? That is outright false, and I would love to see the source for that claim ... --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 08:26, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Actually, researching a bit I found that biopsychosocial model and biopsychiatry are just parts of the same topic. Exactly how they relates is hard to tell. But in this article from APA the writer actually criticizes the biopsychosocial model. This article is also good, from a noted anti-psychiatrist. I am noting these here for now. I am starting to think that you are right about some kind of holistic linking between the anti-psychiatry article and this one, however I feel the anti-psychiatry debate is actually the old incarnation whilst I am unsure of what is the proper term of the "underdog" in the psychiatric debate. But certainly, the debate is less and less controversial amongst specialists and here in Europe. Actually, I am starting to wonder if there also should be a generic article on the treatment of mental health illnesses since this eclipses all the anti-psychiatry subtopics, psychiatry and psychology --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 10:37, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

I think the viewpoint that you're talking about needs (1) a reasonably widely agreed name & (2) a positive model of psychiatry (as opposed to simply criticisms of other models), before it can get its own article on wikipedia. The first is necessary so that there is some chance of consensus as to what the article is about, the second because such bare criticisms logically belong in the articles about the subjects they are criticising (per the sentiment in template:criticism-section), and it is only this positive model that would necessitate an article on its own. Under my proposals, if/when this happens, this new article will simply be slotted into the disambiguation page & template, in the same way that the existing articles are. HrafnTalkStalk 11:11, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

But I think the APA article I linked, by the president of APA no less, should be enough to prove the notability of the POV stated by opponents of biopsychiatry. Now, I have also learnt that biosocial psychiatry was developed in response to the criticism posed by opponents of biopsychiatry and that this view is also opposed by many opponents of psychiatry. The "positive model" you want is readily available. It is just that the focus on medicines and biological explanations are scoffed upon by me and many professionals because it does not have empirical proof. So, this leads me to a question. Are there any articles on the "medicine industry conspiracy"? I think this controversy is important in order to understand the context which the modern anti-psychiatry works in. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 13:45, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Ummm, is this this "biosocial psychiatry" that you are talking about the Biopsychosocial model that you previously called "irrelevant" (so you will please pardon my astonishment if this is the case), or some other previously unmentioned model? If the former, then it already has its own article, so a second one on that topic, built on the remains of this one, would seem superfluous. If the latter, then you have to tell us what it is, and what the WP:RSs documenting its existence are. HrafnTalkStalk 14:57, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, bio-psycho-social model. I have rarely seen discussion about that term in the context of the anti-psychiatry debate other than a way to say that "both social and biological reasons" may explain a mental illness. The term is a more "politically correct" or moderate version of purely biological explanation; and I believe that this is the model most psychologists and psychotherapists use. I feel it is irrelevant to the article since the term is not widely criticized; kinda like in politics moderate parties are not the target of heavy criticism. Most of all because the term is confusing in the context of anti-psychiatry, especially since many of the arguments against biopsychiatry would be valid for the "bio" part of bio-psycho-social. You get it? I think you misunderstood me slightly, I did not suggest that biopsychosocial would serve a "positive model". Critics of biopsychiatry are mainly proponents of the idea that the majority of mental illnesses are caused by social factors, and I am fairly happy with how these are represented in their respective articles currently. Another aspect is that the "positive model" is treatment where psychiatry is no longer the sole responsible in treating mental illness.

The bio-psycho-social model should be linked from biopsychiatry as an alternative that has gained ground in the later years, especially since this is a fairly mainstream model. This is somewhat hard to source since it is a historic issue and still pretty recent. But the article from APA I linked earlier states indirectly that the bio-psycho-social is the preferred method (but notes that in practice it is bio-bio-bio model). Including it in the template would make sense. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 16:19, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

Formal proposal

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Please offer your opinion with Agree/Disagree (or similar, signed), or if you wish to propose a modified or alternate proposal, with Modify or Alternate as appropriate. (PS: if anybody can work out how the section-merging templates on WP:MERGE work, they might like to label the appropriate sections -- I can't for the life of me work them out.)

Comment. I have made the appropriate {{mergeto}} and {{mergefrom}} edits to inform stakeholders of your proposal. I would suggest it might be a good idea to drop a note at at a few of the wikiprojects also. Rockpocket 18:46, 2 January 2008 (UTC)

strongly disagree: Given the dearth of evidence supporting biopsychiatry, the serious controversy over the theoretical basis for predominantly drug oriented treatments based on prevailing pro-drug propaganda, rather than hard science, needs to be covered properly. The biopsychiatry controversy article is needed in order to adequately cover the extensive debate over the many substantive unresolved issues regarding the subject. Ombudsman (talk) 01:24, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment: (1) Your argument would appear to lead more reasonably to the conclusion that criticisms of biological psychiatry are not given WP:DUE weight in that article, rather than to the retention of a separate article. (2) An article solely on these criticisms will always tend to be an uncohesive grab-bag (e.g. of deficiencies of the biomedical paradigm, assorted abuses of it, etc), lacking the topic being criticised, to give it structure. HrafnTalkStalk 21:07, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment: per template:criticism-section it shouldn't have to -- WP:V & WP:RS criticism of Biopsychiatry should be given WP:DUE weight throughout the article, rather than being constrained to a single criticism section (let alone be shunted off into a separate article). Splitting the viewpoints out into two articles all but ensures that neither gets due weight in the opposing article -- as has happened in practice, at least in this article. Either fearing that anti-biopsychiatry activists may demand undue weight, or that you might have to give them due weight, in Biological psychiatry, is hardly a rationale for retention of this article. HrafnTalkStalk 06:17, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

strongly disagree: Even the American Psychiatric Association’s DSM, the standard psychiatric diagnosis manual, recognizes the lack of biomarkers in the major psychiatric disorders. Furthermore, Benjaminbruheim has made excellent points above: (1) critics of biopsych are a growing body of mental health professionals and not a tiny minority. The debate has raged for decades: it is indeed notable[9]; (2) The debate is now basically separate from antipsychiatry for historical reasons. As Benjaminbruheim pointed out, it is the "modern incarnation" of it and therefore deserves an article of its own. (3) We may however rename the article as Biopsychiatry criticism —the very title I chose back almost at the end of the 2006 ArbCom process! (4) Benjaminbruheim is right again by pointing out that lots of sourced references have been removed from an article which got mid-grade on the psychology assessment scale. Also, since Google is not our friend here, some of the removed material from the books and primary sources of the previous incarnation of this (nowadays basically deleted) article ought to be placed back. It may be edited by other editors, but restored (I have no objections to balance it with the opposing POV, but I do disagree with removing tons of WP:V-content). Finally, that original article will be expanded in the future by much more knowledgeable editors than me; in the future it will be too long to be merged with either article. —Cesar Tort 07:06, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment: In the event the article is not merged per this proposal (and, ironically enough, this is the first thing that editors who historically have completely opposing opinions appear to agree on) it really needs some of the previously verified material added back. In its current form it really provides little information about the criticisms of biopsychiatry theory, even from within the field, and that that is there is almost without context. Like Cesar, my experience with Hrafn has left me with little enthusiasm or confidence that working together towards that would be constructive (that may simply be a personality clash, though, and thats not to suggest others may not have more success). I urge someone to work towards this with Hrafn, who is clearly keen to find ways to continue to improve this article. Rockpocket 07:38, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

I find Rockpocket's response curious. I explicitly justified my excisions on the basis that the material violated specific policies. If these justifications were invalid, then my excisions should have been queried and reverted at the time (I responded to queries on this talkpage, and did not contest a reversion by Rockpocket himself, as I felt my justification was marginal, and not worth fighting over). If these justifications were valid, then there can be no reason for reintroducing this material. I agree that my interaction with Cesar and Rockpocket has been unconstructive, but would not expect anything else from interaction based on accusations of "wikilawyering" and "vandalism", and on repeated imperious 'suggestions' with no basis in policy, respectively. HrafnTalkStalk 08:58, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

"...then my excisions should have been queried and reverted at the time".

Hi Hrafn. I didn't want to do it since that would have meant starting all over again an edit war. If you take a close look at the archived talk page that User:Joema called your attention to, you will see why I refrained from an immediate revert. —Cesar Tort 09:33, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Given that I had exhibited no propensity to edit war on this article, assuming that I would do so is hardly assuming good faith. And even if that were a good reason, it is hardly a reason not to query them here on talk -- I responded to the three queries you did make (in spite of the fact that they were (1) based solely on an unverifiable conversation; (2) on a failure to acknowledge the existence of a policy that I'd just quoted and cited in an edit summary & (3) based on an excision/edit summary combination that I never employed, respectively). And you have provided no evidence that my excisions were "unjustified". HrafnTalkStalk 10:42, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

ok. I was just afraid of another little editorial war and didn't want to engage. But let's forget that and work together from now on. Now you don't only have what Heinze told me informally about the brain imaging techniques inside his very labs (blood perfusion is not a biomarker), but what the DSM itself clearly states about no lab proofs to test for the presence of the major psychiatric disorders. —Cesar Tort 16:37, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

I would however note that nothing I have said above has in any way indicated that I would be amenable to wholesale unquestioned readmission of content. Where a strong argument can be made (on the basis of reliable and verifiable sources and the relevant wikipedia policy) that an excision was unjustified, I would be amenable, on a case by case basis. I don't have a copy of DSM immediately to hand (we are still on DSM-IV aren't we?), but remember it as being a very large tome, so a specific citation to a page (preferably with a quote on talkpage) where it specifically discusses biomarkers would be needed. HrafnTalkStalk 01:05, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Hmmm. This is slightly different than saying "no biomarkers for schizophrenia" -- the latter statement appearing to be directly contradicted by statements made in Endophenotype. This probably stems from differing definitions of "biomarker", and creates a situation where we need to tread carefully (and probably need an cited, authoritative, definition for the term, as well as taking care to avoid violating WP:SYNTH in tying things together). HrafnTalkStalk 16:37, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

You yourself quoted it above, when citing the 2003 APA press release when the hunger strikers defeated the APA (as discussed way below):

Brain science has not advanced to the point where scientists or clinicians can point to readily discernible pathologic lesions or genetic abnormalities that in and of themselves serve as reliable or predictive biomarkers of a given mental disorder or mental disorders as a group.

"of a given mental disorder or mental disorders" is even more encompassing than just schizophrenia. And this is an official APA statement.

Comment: It would appear that both sides (pro- and anti- biopsychiatry) want to retain two separate articles as neither side want to deal with the negotiation necessary to attain WP:DUE weight within a single article. This Faustian compromise would appear to be detrimental to wikipedia for two reasons: (1) it is highly likely to lead to both articles giving undue weight to their dominant viewpoints; and (2) it means that the content from neither viewpoint will receive as much skeptical review as if they were forced to coexist. The result is something very similar (though perhaps not identical) to a WP:POVFORK. HrafnTalkStalk 21:25, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment: I believe editors are open to negotiation, but get rapidly demoralized and retreat when treated poorly and dismissed as a "POV-pusher". Which I kind of what I have been trying to point out to you. When working in this sort of environment requires large amounts of good faith and a willingness to accept other POVs, rather than steadfastly enshrine one's own in policy. I'm not suggesting this is anyone editors fault, as there has been finger-pointing from a number of editors, but I don't believe the current methods are working. If we are to get this subject back in a decent shape, then people need to work together, and to do that there needs to be a basic level of respect afforded to each other. Rockpocket 21:36, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Ahh, so this is all my fault, in spite of the fact that the situation I described (immediately above) had become firmly entrenched long before I came upon the scene. That this article exists is obvious evidence of an inability of the two viewpoints to coexist and form a due weight balance within a single article. But by all means continue blaming me at every opportunity, rather than making any attempt to create a cohesive article on biopsychiatry that reflects due weight to all viewpoints.HrafnTalkStalk 00:21, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

(Attempt at a rather more WP:AGF version of the above:) Given that the situation I described above appears to have solidified long before I came upon the scene, I do not think my recent calling a WP:SPADE a spade is likely to have exacerbated it. Given that this equilibrium is one of side each having their own article and largely ignoring each other, I don't see how simply exhorting everybody to get along/assume good faith will bring about any meaningful change. This problem requires specific proposals of structural change to move forward. I made one, it appears to be in the process of being shot down in flames. For the reasons I outlined immediately above, I think that a single-article structure is the only way to avoid the current dysfunctional situation. HrafnTalkStalk 00:47, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

It seems to me editors who were on opposing sides of the last ArbCom (myself and Cesar, for example) have actually regained enough mutual trust to have a rather collegial working relationship. Your defensiveness in assuming I was blaming it all on you is a prime example of the suspicions editors have for each other. As I explicitly noted, I do not consider it your fault, as you too were accused of things in bad faith. I believe part of the reason your proposal was shot down was because your position is largely seen as one of attempting to marginalize one POV and there is is suspicion over your plan. That may not be the case, and I personally don't think it is, but that is how it has come across. So where to from here, well I don't know. But unless editors from both sides are willing to put aside their accusations and suspicions and trust that each other actually want the same thing - good, fair and balanced coverage - its going no-where quickly. Rockpocket 02:13, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

It seems you think this debate is a debate akin to politics or unprofessionals arguin against professionals. Fact is that the biocontroversy has caused huge changes in psychotherapy all over the world (but perhaps in lesser degree in the US). As late as today I read an article in a major norwegian newspaper where a psychiatrist about this very ordeal and how this has caused psychologists researchers to use MRI and psychiatrists to look at social factors; and how the border between the two factions have been blurred out. I hadn't heard about it, but he mentioned a study where they found that people healed from depression by using placebo had structural changes in the brain. Now, there has been very few actually arguing against the anti-biopsychiatry faction so balancing the article will be hard. Most criticism I find is about the fact that militant anti-psychiatrists "scare people from getting help". I would love some hard numbers on this (and I do think they exist), but this is a strawmen considering the very concrete science and system critique behind the criticism that has occurred. I rather want this article to convey the story as it has happened in the last 20 (?) years rather than be a point-for-point attack on the field. At best we can document the gradual changes of the major models across the world. Sorry for the harsh words earlier, but it really seems you attack the article believing the field is solely a mish-mash of pamphlet-pressers, scare mongers and scientologists. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 02:55, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

----

The above discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section.

Reliable Sources

Good to see you back. I've followed some of your editing in the past and enjoyed it. Your library might be very helpful in identifying the important actors in the debate. The biopsychiatry debate has not been polluted by activists as much as the anti-psychiatry debate has. Now, I would love good sources on the criticism of the low effeciency of regular medicines (often just ~5-10% over placebo counts as "major" in science) and the fact that the Finnish study on adoption shows that inheriting schizophrenia from a mother is just 10% as opposed to 1%. The interesting aspect of the latter study is that social factors ("bad" vs "good" families) is a bigger influence. For the latter I've seen it mentioned by psychiatrists in interviews, albeit in norwegian, so it is not a good source. I hope you can help out with this. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 17:36, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks, Benjaminbruheim. I remember having read something about it in Read et al Models of Madness. However I only have the 2006 Spanish translation. When I get home I'll take a look :) —Cesar Tort 20:14, 3 January 2008 (UTC)

In Models of Madness there is an article by Colin A. Ross and John Read about the myths and realities of anti-psychotic drugs. They approach what they call the Myth #3: that anti-psychotic drugs are more efficient than the placebo. In other article of that book Jay Joseph addresses the twin studies. The "bad" vs "good" families subject is addressed in a chapter by John read, Lisa Gododman, Anthony Morrison and Volkmar Aderhold; and also in another article by John Read, Fred Seymour and Loren Mosher. Mosher's work is obviously a RS. —Cesar Tort 04:24, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Readmission of content

"I would however note that nothing I have said above has in any way indicated that I would be amenable to wholesale unquestioned readmission of content" —Hrafn way above.

Why not? What you removed was properly sourced and WP is no paper encyclopedia. That's why — no paper encyclopedia— User:Joema doesn't want merging articles. In the 2006 ArbCom we discussed a lot about whether 25% of criticism should be enough in a single article and agreement wasn't reached. Reason: because of the very nature of the controversy itself, sooner of latter critics could overwhelm the Biological psychiatry article.

Let me explain this with one example. You eliminated above an APA quotation arguing that I quoted it out of context; and you cited the full APA quotation. But what you really missed is that the full quotation was a response to a 2003 hunger strike in which six MindFreedom members placed an ultimatum to APA: either you provide us with scientific evidence that our disorders are biological therefore justifying the involuntarily drugging you shrinks inflict on us, or we won't eat. After some time APA released the full text you quoted, the text that I only quoted part of it.

But there's the rub! In that full text APA states that "Research already has elucidated some of the mechanisms of action of medications that are effective for depression, schizophrenia, anxiety, attention deficit" and so on. The real problem starts when you see that even some psychiatrists disagree with this full APA statement. "If it responds to medication it must be biological", these psychiatrists say, is a fallacy because of the placebo effect. And many neurologists know that the "ventricular enlargement" claim, also quoted in the full text, is equivocal since such ventricular enlargement has also been found in many non-schizophrenics. Back in 2003 APA was desperate to say something to the media to save face during the hunger strike and released that press release knowing very well that not all neurologists, MDs, and even psychiatrists would endorse the full quotation (that you presented as proof that I quoted it out of context). Ironically, the fully quoted text could make APA look even worse than the article I wrote with User:Bookish because it would be tempting then to disclose the fact that MindFreedom hunger strikers defeated the APA in 2003!

Take for example the most reliable source according to your extremely-high bar standards, what the DSM-IV says about no lab proofs for major psychiatric disorders. This is the real problem with the field called biopsychiatry and it explains another important quotation that you removed:

“

The gist of my argument is that men like Kraepelin, Bleuler and Freud were not what they claimed or seem to be — namely, physicians or medical investigators; they were, in fact, religious-political leaders and conquerors. Instead of discovering new diseases, they extended, through psychiatry, the imagery, vocabulary, jurisdiction, and hence the territory of medicine to what were not, and are not, diseases in the original Virchowian sense.

”

Szasz is probably the best-known psychiatrist in America and precisely because he has been criticizing his own chosen field for decades. As to date lab proofs are still missing; and the Szasz 1979 quotation cited above is still "the gist" to understand the whole of the biopsych controversy. If you remove the quotation, you are simply silencing one of the most notable psychiatrists.

As I said, I have no objection to add opposing pov, but the readmission of the content of the original article is a must.

I do not agree. Perhaps it could be revise more to your liking, but outsale removal is to censor arguments raised in the debate. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 16:39, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

The quote cherry-picked the most downbeat phrases out of a generally upbeat paragraph (I provide the full context above). It is quote-mining to misrepresent the cited source's viewpoint. In the second excision, the the cited source for the statement lists completely different "examples" of why it is "not undisputed" to then one listed in the article. This "mix 'n' match" of statement and example is a clear violation of WP:SYNTH.HrafnTalkStalk 17:13, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Citations to an anti-biopsychiatry activist whose findings have been rejected as not meeting the standards of expert scientific testimony in federal court (and to the organisation he founded).[14][15][16]

This is WP:OR. You really need to find a source telling that schizophrenia is undoubtly a biological disorder and include that as a counter argument instead of removing a statement that has been raised in the biopsychiatry controversy; the topic of this article. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 16:39, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

I do not believe stating that cited scientific research (in Causes of schizophrenia#Genetic) providing strong evidence suggesting a heritable (i.e. genetic and therefore biological) component for schizophrenia contradicts a claim (from a non-researcher) that it is "yet to be proven that schizophrenia is a bio-medical condition" is WP:OR. Even lacking this contradiction, Shannon Sumrall is at best a marginal source for the state of play in research. HrafnTalkStalk 17:24, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

This argument has been raised by many professionals. And this is a response to the science you cite. The heritable chance is just 10% and not strong enough to be considered a causation. Social factors are stronger, as suggested above. You are comparing apples and oranges and I argue your removal is a reverse WP:SYNTH. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 19:41, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

These are just a few, more easily identifiable, examples: I could go on and on. HrafnTalkStalk 16:06, 4 January 2008 (UTC) ...and I will go on to defend the justifications of my excisions on a case by case basis, if specific excisions are challenged. HrafnTalkStalk 16:11, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Here in office I have no time to reply point by point. Suffice it to say that after placing the "cn" tag you are supossed to wait for a month or two. Instead, you waited about a day (!!) to remove everything; leaving editors no chance to source your requests properly. (Also, I sourced one requested citation and another editor changed my source to a wiki internal source; you didn't notice that and removed the whole sentence.) I insist that all must be put back again and leave us with the proper time to find the RS. —Cesar Tort 16:25, 4 January 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.137.38.104 (talk)

If you are referring to #9 above, the refed excision had been unsourced since September. Could you please provide difs on the "wiki internal source" incident, as I have no immediate recall of it. HrafnTalkStalk 16:44, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

As stated above, I have little time to search for diffs at work. I do remember however that my source was the most orthodox Mexican biopsychiatrist, Ramón de la Fuente Muñiz; and that an editor in good faith, but misleadingly, changed it and linked it internally. —201.137.38.104 (talk) 17:08, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

What happened was that you cited it to a redlink[23] (with op cit), Aspro turned this redlink into a link to another wiki[24], and I deleted.[25] If I had paid attention to the "op cit" (which was the functional part of the reference), I should have left this statement in place until excising it with the rest of the section (and thus the rest of the Fuente-cited material) here[26] because the section provided no (WP:V/WP:RS) information on its stated topic: the "lack of biomarkers", rendering the remaining statements in it irrelevant. HrafnTalkStalk 17:48, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

All of this is unresponsive to the issue. The content must be placed back in order to source it adequately. Immediate removals are inappropriate.

No. Because the excisions were justified (per #1-3,5-9 above, as well as other reasons), the content should not be placed back until they are appropriately sourced, except for statements that misrepresent their source, which should not be placed back at all. To place back improperly sourced material is a violation of WP:V and/or WP:RS. HrafnTalkStalk 18:22, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Are you interpreting policy correctly? Should requested citations be removed immediately if an editor doesn't source it in a day or two? I leave this question to the two admins who are watching over this discussion to comment about it. I am no wikilawyer and won't engage in wikilawyering here. —201.137.38.104 (talk) 18:29, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

I would recommend to revert article to the version when you pov tagged it; just before I posted the comment “Still another NPOV dispute” in this page; that is, before tons of content were removed. I don’t care it’s pov tagged again. It makes it much easier to work from that earlier draft. On the other hand, as it stands today, the article makes no sense at all. —201.137.38.104 (talk) 19:11, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree. I am willing to help sourcing this, and work to find the responses from the genetics community as well to balance it. But I am afraid the response from the genetics community has been against the fringe anti-psychiatrist commmunity. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 19:41, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Agreed. But take a look at The Gene Illusion. It hits big in Google as you can see in that article's talk page. And the author is not an "antipsychiatrist". —201.137.38.104 (talk) 20:16, 4 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I am sure that I am "interpreting policy correctly". WP:V clearly states: "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material." (my emphsis) Therefore restoring material without meeting that burden, by providing WP:V & WP:RS citations, is in clear violation of this policy. For this reason, reverting to "the version when [I] pov tagged it" is not acceptable, because it violates this policy. HrafnTalkStalk 07:49, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

The general etiquette which I have seen observed, which tends to moderate the harshness of WP:V, is that long-standing unsourced content should be {{fact}}-tagged first, unless it is also otherwise problematic (including because it is improperly sourced, rather than unsourced) in which case it may be deleted summarily. Where content is newly introduced or reintroduced (even if its original removal was in violation of the {{fact}}-first etiquette) it should be summarily reverted unless properly sourced. I claim no authority for such etiquette, but would consider it the furthest I would be willing to go to moderate/"take a pragmatic view of" WP:VHrafnTalkStalk 08:22, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I am not opposed to (re)introduction of content where it is WP:RS, has appropriately WP:NPOV framing and fairly represents the views of the source. To this end I have reintroduced the entire APA statement paragraph (previously very selectively quoted) with more neutral framing. Likewise, I am not opposed to the article citing the views of well-qualified experts who are anti-biopsychiatry, as long as they are clearly identified as such (and not implicitly presented as being a neutral or majority view). I would however note that the article already contains views from four such (one admittedly being Joseph himself, and only briefly), so there cannot be too much expansion of this without sacrificing neutrality. HrafnTalkStalk 03:46, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

If this article will be renamed Biopsychiatry criticism I see no reason why not expand the "criticism" precisely, i.e., full readmission of content, and work together from that draft. —Cesar Tort 04:15, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Such a rename would turn the article into an explicit WP:POVFORK, and would likely result in either immediate reversion or AfD. HrafnTalkStalk 04:39, 5 January 2008 (UTC) In other words such a rename would not be a means of avoiding "sacrificing neutrality" while expanding criticism, but would rather make this sacrifice very obvious, very public, and very obviously intentional. HrafnTalkStalk 04:52, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree. I suggest the title can be changed once content surfaces that suggests a better name. Also, for one of your edits. It has been shown that talk therapy, even placebo, shows up on medical imaging. Funny eh? :) --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 05:49, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I would point out that even were this rename not an explicit admission of a WP:POVFORK, it would not enable the the readmission of content that misrepresents its cited source (which is against WP:V regardless of the name of the article), nor would it suspend WP:UNDUE, & WP:NPOV generally -- it would just make application of it very problematic due to the explicitly POV article name. HrafnTalkStalk 08:01, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that some of the content in the non-deleted version Biopsychiatry controversy should be removed. For example, the Michel Foucault sentence belongs to the Antipsychiatry article. But I still don't understand why don't you want to restore the deleted material and leave Benjaminbruheim and me to source it properly?? —Cesar Tort 18:05, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

pov tag

I have tagged it. Hrafn is just writing anotherBiological psychiatry article. I will revert the whole article to the above cited version and work from that draft with the help of the two admins watching over this article. Cesar Tort 21:36, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

That objection you have "reproducible" would better be sourced really well if it is to be in the article. Reproducible implies 100% hit, something which is outrightly false; the science cited just implies a chance so it doesn't match the sources even. It even implies a methodological way of diagnosing schizophrenia, which is outright false. I bid you luck in sourcing stuff tho. :) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Benjaminbruheim (talk • contribs) 22:43, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

You have tagged the article for violation of WP:NPOV because I reintroduced material (as stridently demanded by you on this page), but in a manner that gave WP:DUE weight (itself a part of WP:NPOV) to all the views expressed in that paragraph, not just the ones that could be cherry-picked to support an anti-biopsychiatry view. It should not be surprising that I therefore find this complaint to be ludicrous.

In spite of my informing you of why the reversion you have repeatedly demand would be in clear violation of WP:V, you continue in your demands for it while ignoring the point I have raised. I consider this to be a clear act of "bad faith" (as defined in WP:AGF), so will revert without discussion or comment any attempt at such a reversion until my point (made previously but repeated here) is first addressed:Such a reversion would be a violation of WP:V, which clearly states: "The burden of evidence lies with the editor who adds or restores material."
I would point out that such a reversion of the "reintroduction" of unverified material is clearly sanctioned by WP:V. HrafnTalkStalk 03:12, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I have an idea. Cesar, why don't you work on above cited version in your user space and perhaps you can then demonstrate to Hrafn how you can address his WP:V concerns in that version. There may be some scope for compromise on some material, could then be moved across to the "live" version. Rockpocket 03:26, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I have no objection to Cesar doing this, though will subject any proposed version to the same scrutiny I applied to the original article. I do however think that an article focused on the issues VoA lists in 'Rename' below would be a more productive way forward. HrafnTalkStalk 04:40, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I actually agree (who'd of thought that?). My suggestion was aimed at a mechanism towards rehabilitating some parts of the old article that Cesar thought he could source verifiably. Ultimately, the same scrutiny would occur, but at least it would kick start the discussion onto specific content, rather than the more general discussion that is going on. However, I think it would be better still if you, he and any other interested party could start working together on the expansion, starting with the sections you propose below. Rockpocket 05:06, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm concerned that VP:DUE is being misapplied. You claim there is weighting problem, but the majority of mental health workers (at least here in Norway) do not follow a biopsychiatric model. So, removing what I consider to be correctly sourced material, and introducing counter-material which is not even true is not the way to go. I agree with the NPOV because it does not represent the issue in accordance with reality. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 03:34, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Although I originally raised a general concern over WP:UNDUE, I made almost no mention of it in the justifications for excising content, and even the few I did make were justifiable on grounds of misrepresentation of (the neutrality of) sources, in addition to WP:UNDUE.

Your own personal observation (or mine) is hardly a basis for determining the preponderance of views, nor is the viewpoint of Norway alone. Have you any hard facts to back up this observation? Has the psychiatric profession abandoned the use of the drugs that have their basis in the biopsychiatric model (unlikely given the anti-biopsychiatry charge that the drug companies have captured the profession)?

Interestingly enough, it is the books and critics that raise the issue. And in practice psychiatric profession has abandoned the use of drugs by themselves; research (and other articles point this out) that medicines by themselves are not very effective. There is scientific consensus about this point. But I start to agree that the article might rather become a "Controversies in psychiatry"-article since this started after all as a response to issues in psychiatry, and the topics raised elsewhere on the page has been debated by the actors of this debate. Anyway, WP:V is satisfied because the issues that critics have are raised in the books themselves; and it is perfectly possible to state these arguments per WP:PSTS. Personally I think it is you who has to prove that the critics are partisans. I beg you to find any psychiatrist that claim that psychiatric illnesses are caused by biological factors. Per now none of the cites do state this. The APA quote only says that it is "likely" and the gene link states only an "indication" (which is not conclusive causation). Per bio-psycho-social model ie. schizophrenia might be triggered by underlying biological reasons. Note the "might". I will let the RFC go on, then start reintroducing material that is WP:V. Statements by critics are perfectly relevant to the article and removing them is POV-pushing preconceptions that the public has about psychiatry.

I also suspect you are a skeptical rationalist. I think you misunderstand the scope of this debate. This is not a pseudoscience issue, but a moral debate. Hence the issues raised in literature are relevant to the article. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 16:50, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Rename

I'd like to rename this article to something like "Applied biopsychiatry controversy". That would allow for an actual article, rather than the broken shadow of stub we have right now (which doesn't really say anything anymore). As I said above, most criticism people find seems to be of drug companies, oversimplified theories, unscientific "metaphors", as well as social implications of ignoring social causes and "blaming the brain", without any provable disease or at least biological criteria to divide "normal"/"responsible" and "abnormal"/"irrational". Even still, WP:RS will have to be enforced, so a lot of the first material that was removed (blogs, unmentionable people) ought to stay out of this article. Voice-of-All 23:11, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

Of course! Blogs and unmentionable people must be removed. I am not sure if the version I wrote with Bookish contained blogs (Bookish never allowed that). Do you approve about reverting to an earlier version, before tons of contend were removed? If so, which version? Cesar Tort 23:26, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

The problem is the "metaphors" and are used by practitioners, not researchers. The oversimplified theories appear in popular media and folk knowledge, not academic journals and text books. Most criticism you will find won't really be talking about "biopsychiatry" but some non-sequiturs used in misapplications of it. Much of what this article used to be was like that. As long as it stays with this name, it can't be re-added. At this point, this page is a dead-end as is. So I won't be endorsing any reverts now. Voice-of-All 00:04, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

In that case just move the article: rename it. After that we could revert.

"Most criticism you will find won't really be talking about "biopsychiatry" but some non-sequiturs used in misapplications of it".

Have you read the Szasz quotation I cited above that Hfarn censored (along with most of the article)? It is directed to the whole field of biopsych, not misapplications. And there are many mental health professionals who share his views.

I would point out that this claim is a bald untruth. As can be seen from this snapshot of the article before I made any edits to it, it does not contain this quote. To my knowledge, it has not been introduced since. Further, even if I had removed content that included that quote, to claim that this is "censorship" without further substantiation would still have been a clear violation of WP:AGF. HrafnTalkStalk 03:33, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

A few comments:

I think 'Applied biopsychiatry controversy' would just add to the confusion. I would suggest 'Controversies in applied biopsychiatry', or simply 'Controversies in biopsychiatry' instead. That biopsychiatry, like any other field, has its controversies is (I would suspect) undisputed. That these individual controversies add up to a grand controversy is (at least according to Rockpocket in 'Application of WP:UNDUE to this article' above) heavily disputed. An article on these controversies would therefore be more clearly a legitimate subject-fork, and less likely to develop into an illegitimate WP:POVFORK.

The excision of content had nothing to do with the article's title (as I have repeatedly pointed out, WP:UNDUE applies regardless of article title), but was for reasons I enumerated in 'Readmission of content', which would apply regardless of article title.

The original article made only peripheral mention of the issues you list. I would heartily welcome (WP:NPOV-complaint) sections on 'Overmedication in psychiatry', 'Drug company capture of the psychiatric profession' (though eventually an entire article on their capture of the entire medical profession may be warranted), 'Reductionism in biopsychiatric research' (the latter probably fitting better in an article without "Applied" in its title), etc. These sections would be suitable content regardless of a article-title change.

I have noticed since making these comments that VoA was talking about reductionism in the application of biopsychiatric research, not of reductionism of the research itself. This means (1) that my parenthetical caveat about titles in my last bullet-point above is therefore moot; but (2) that it may be that finding WP:RSs documenting this reductionism may be more difficult (as by VoA's admission it resides "in popular media and folk knowledge"). HrafnTalkStalk 06:12, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Thinking about it further, from the point of view of somebody who has worked in the field of regulatory economics, I would be flabbergasted if the pharmaceutical industry did not attempt capture of the psychiatric profession (and the medical profession likewise). To expect them to do otherwise, given the large amounts of money involved, would be a bit like expecting big tobacco to make genuine attempts to dissuade people from smoking -- a triumph of altruism and morality over profit and capitalism. Likewise I can see a strong economic argument why overmedication could be a problem -- as prescribing medication takes less of a psychiatrist's time and yields a more immediate effect on patients' functioning, than over courses of therapy. However, "would flabbergast Hrafn if it weren't true" is hardly a WP:V & WP:RS citation, so such citations for these issues need to be found. In fact I'm of the opinion that setting a lower standard for citation for your own viewpoint is selling that viewpoint short -- a careful reader may well take away an impression that the viewpoint lacks legitimacy because of such lower standards. HrafnTalkStalk 08:49, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

So would "Controversies in applied biological psychiatry" be acceptable? Voice-of-All 05:51, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, though I'd still express a mild preference to eliminating the "applied" if it isn't absolutely necessary -- to lower the word-count, and to avoid ruling out any theoretical biological psychiatry controversy that might turn up from inclusion in the article. HrafnTalkStalk 06:07, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Straightforward question

Since Hrafn removed tons of content after a couple of days without giving me a chance to source them properly (the amateurish sources I added from my job, without my library at hand, were not the best I could do), I would like to ask you a straightforward question, Rockpocket:

Is there a policy that impedes me to restore the deleted material of those two or three days, when the article was virtually emptied?

I very much doubt that that policy exists. Hrafn edited single-handedly the article when I was so overwhelmed by work (at least this Saturday is my weekend) that I couldn’t even discuss at length. It seems to me that Hrafn has hijacked the article and we have been behaving like lambs, if not in the talk pages, we have done it in the article itself. Hrafn will never agree with any article that explains the criticism that many scholars have done to biopsych because he believes in censorship and that only the orthodox pov can find a place in WP. Frankly, as busy as I am in real world I have not the time nor the patience to argue with such an editor anymore.

Benjaminbruheim is right that WP:undue is a provincial American pov. Just one example: the USA buys most of the Ritalin to drug their children (90% of consumption a few years ago). Nordic people don’t do this: they focus on social and school changes instead of socializing the child thru licit drugs. WP:undue is relative with regard this article.

I iterate that if there is no policy that impedes me to revert the massive removals done without consensus since I placed the comment “Still another NPOV dispute” above in this talk page, I will revert. So please Rockpocket and Voice of All: tell me if what I plan to do is ok with policy.

There is no policy the impedes you from reverting to a prior version if you believe that is an improvement over the current one, however that is something I wouldn't recommend for a number of reasons. Firstly, there is nothing stopping Hrafn from reverting it back, and then we risk an edit war. That is in no-one's interest and will not resolve the impasse. Secondly, Hrafn's edits were in good faith, I believe, and justified in policy, or at least his interpretation of it. They may have been done relatively quickly, but the were not unannounced, he spelled out his intention in advance.

I'm not sure I agree with all of his edits and his application of policy, and feel he may have gone a little too far in the opposite direction, but I don't think a mass revert to undo all his work is the answer. Many of his edits were good, and a mass revert would lose that good work. Besides, I may be an admin, but that doesn't mean my interpretation of policy trumps his.

I would suggest instead, that there is some kind of complex merge where disputed material can be included, appropriately sourced in in context, after discussion. One way of doing that is to embrace my suggestion above where you work on sections of the old version of the article in your user space. I noted with enthusiasm that Hraf's welcomes sections on 'Overmedication in psychiatry', 'Drug company capture of the psychiatric profession' and 'Reductionism in biopsychiatric research'. These seem to me like areas that could be fleshed out to give the article context, and an area to focus on and find common ground.

I hate to sound like a hippy here, but looking backwards is a bad idea. Whats done is done. If this article is to get better then I think we have to accept the article, as it is, as a starting point and move forward to improve it. Thats not to say that bits of the old article may not be used, just that they should be discussed and, where appropriate, sourced anew while writing the new sections. Rockpocket 05:00, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

RfC: majority viewpoint on the validity of the biopsychiatric model of psychiatry

Is the majority viewpoint of the psychiatric profession, and particularly of the psychiatric research community, that the biopsychiatric model of psychiatry is, by and large, accepted or rejected?
In correctly allocating WP:DUE weight in this article (as required under WP:NPOV), it is important to characterise whether the viewpoint accepting or rejecting the biopsychiatric model is the majority viewpoint. This issue has been subject to dispute, and comment is therefore requested, noting:

that the issue for which comment is sought is on the question of the majority viewpoint of the psychiatric profession, and particularly of the psychiatric research community, not the individual viewpoints of editors on this issue; and

that, as always in wikipedia discussions, greater weight will be placed on comments containing (preferably WP:V & WP:RS) substantiation than those merely making bald assertions. This is particularly true as a statement on this issue may need to be placed in the article (and thus need WP:V & WP:RS sources).

Speaking as a psychiatrist, no-one really talks of themselves as a bio-psychiatrist other than the few who specialise in neuropsychiatry or those who are particularly interested in psychopharmacology. Others would generally consider themselves merely as psychiatrists and many I would hazard a guess see themselves as balanced or not preferring one model over another. Thus answering the question "The Majority" probably would not consider themselves as bio-psychiatrists.

However there is documented concern from psychiatrists within the profession and including notable ones at that, that as a whole the profession has headed in a biological direction since the late 1960s or early 1970s. The reasons cited have been varied. cheers, Casliber (talk·contribs) 08:51, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

PS: I'll have to muse upon good sources for this. I saw something recently but have momentarily forgotten where. There will be sources though. cheers, Casliber (talk·contribs) 08:53, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Has the "biological direction" that the "profession has headed in" been sufficiently substantial that this "biological direction" could be legitimately considered to be the "majority viewpoint"? Are there any competing directions/counter-currents/resistances that could instead be legitimately considered to be that "majority"?

Do the majority of the profession consider that those researching the problem from a Biopsychiatric standpoint have taken things too far, that time and money being spent on biological mechanisms, genetics and drugs would be better spent on other lines of enquiry?

Ok, in the main, most psychiatrists would admit they use a Biopsychosocial model, however the term is a misnomer really. A 'model' implies a more of a specific theory with detailed equations and explanations etc. whereas this model is more of a paradigm -a loose overview which says that there are biological, psychological and social inputs. Any deeper analysis lies not with this model as such but a number of theories further down the track. The Trauma model is held as important by many but probably not a majority. biological psychiatry as highlighted on the page predominates alot of published research and practices, however, the problem is I don't know that anyone within that sphere would call themselves as such. I'll ask some colleagues.cheers, Casliber (talk·contribs) 20:02, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Finally, it is almost impossible to judge if it is a majority that are concerned as per point 3 above. Only a minority of psychiatrists publish in journals. I am not sure of any opinion polls or surveys, as these may provide the best evidence - and an article summarising the same. I'll see what I can dig up.cheers, Casliber (talk·contribs)

About point 3: The article I linked from the president of APA states directly that more effort should be used on non-biological treatment, research and education --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 23:00, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

As it stands now, this argument turns entirely on opinion. It needs to be verified. To make a valid statement either way (majority or minority), I think the article would need to cite a high quality source on this point. Eg, an opinion poll within a major professional society, or a broad practices survey of the profession, or data on the per-client drug prescription rate. Perhaps a sociology researcher somewhere has data on this? --Una Smith (talk) 15:15, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Disclaimer: Realize this is all OR and just a viewpoint and it probably has tons of spelling mistakes. :)

This is an interesting discussion. Let me say though that these terms "biopsychiatric model" and "medical model" don't have much meaning (that I have witnessed) in academic and clinical psychiatry/psychology. These model classifications seem to be something that critics (and I don't necessarily mean that in a negative tone) have created. I think these terms are sometimes vague and don't really apply to whats going on. There are mental health professionals who use only psychoanalysis (psychotherapists are the only ones I've seen do this - and most of them don't just use psychoanalysis) and there are others who only use biological theories to direct their research (usually neuroscientists). Most psychiatrists and clinical psychologists (probably 90%) take a healthy look at both social and biological mechanisms that relate to psychopathology. There are those who specialize in certain fields - neuropsychiatry/psychology, social psychiatry, anthropology, etc. - but I don't think any of those people in those fields wholeheartedly discount other methods of study. It just comes down to what they specialize in. A pathologist who studies biopsies doesn't always just believe that his specialty is the only method of diagnosis and treatment. Same goes for a neuropsychologist or any of these academic "specialties."

Another issue with these terms is that they imply absolutes; both from a treatment perspective and understanding perspective. Most researchers (psychiatrists, neuropsychologists, psychologists, statisticians, neuroscienctists) that I've seen and read about understand that we know practically nothing about mental disorders and are usually, at bare minimum, open to any hypothesis about anything.

Finally, I think this biological perspective comes across as being more prevalent than it really is for two reasons. One, most researchers and a lot of professionals, IMO, believe that social influences (whether having biological predispotions or not) can lead to neurophysiological changes which can be measured. Two, these researchers like presenting objective results in their papers, and IMO, for good reason. If we can discover objective physiological markers which classify or help a diagnosis for a disorder, wouldn't we prefer that over a battery of personality inventories or subjective interviews? Most would probably say yes. In other words, if we could run a blood test instead of administering a questionnaire, wouldn't those in the clinical setting prefer the objective blood test? And biological and medical treatments for disorders are usually new and therefore welcomed. This is the case because if a biological problem can be detected (which they realize is not usually at the root of the problem) than a medical treatment could be used to directly treat that issue.

Again though, I think most MHPs subsribe to both theories. And just because an academic specializes or has PhD in a specific area, that doesn't mean they reject all other theories. Both clinically and academically I think this is the case and I think others do as well. Check out Guze, S. B. (1992). Why Psychiatry is a Branch of Medicine. New York: Oxford University Press and take a look at page 130. Guze has a few good words about this "balance" of perspectives. Chupper (talk) 16:02, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I suspect most practicing psychiatrists will not be particularly interested in underlying theoretical frameworks to their practice, but rather whether their pills help their patients. Amongst researchers, a casual stroll through PubMed on any relevant topic (think depression, schizophrenia, bipolar disorder) will show immediately that almost all research in psychiatry makes extensive mention of "biopsychiatry" concepts, e.g. the dopaminergic systems in schizophrenia, serotonergic systems in depression, etc etc. To suggest that there is a significant dissenting community amongst psychiatry researchers would be a bit of a stretch. A few noisy characters, yes. JFW | T@lk 21:26, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

I wonder whether you actually meant to ask this specific question. I seriously doubt that you could find even a single licensed psychiatrist who believes that personality changes after a head injury, or due to Alzheimers, are essentially non-biological. Similarly, there's reasonable evidence that most people with borderline personality disorder have a problem that is primarily (or possibly entirely) non-biological.

If your question is whether there is significant agreement about a biological model for some psychiatric conditions, then the answer is yes: this is a widely accepted model, it certainly explains some conditions entirely, and even people who are widely regarded as quacks would laugh at you if you claimed that great-grandma's advanced dementia was socially constructed. If, instead, you meant to ask whether biopsychiatry explains a particular condition, then it would be helpful to know which condition you really want to hear about. WhatamIdoing (talk) 22:35, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

The criticism is relevant for the major problems. Schizophrenia, bipolar disorders, depression etc. Now, nobody is arguing that physical traumas can't trigger mental disorders, but that is not really relevant. Dementia is not considered a major psychiatric disease either. Hrafn is asking this because he wonder what weighing this article is; however I feel he uses it to remove criticism against psychiatry because they doesn't represent the view of the majority. Now, the "majority" public don't know much about psychiatry and often have false preconceptions so I think this is problematic. And a lot of the critic against biopsychiatry is from psychologists and psychotherapists, so that makes the notion of weighing it in favor of a specific science is kinda bunk. I already tried establishing that the majority of psychiatrist uses biopsychiatry with a statement from the president of APA who implies that biopsychiatry is often used in favour for the dominating bio-psycho-social model. To me it seems Hrafn is weighing it against his personal preconception of psychiatry as mainstream and criticism as fringe. That's like writing about the Green Party from the angle of Republicans. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 22:52, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

Comment Davidruben

I find the question naive; in summary for what follows, not even "conventional" psychiatrists would adhere just to being labelled as "biopsychiatry model" or indeed exclusively "psychopharmaceutical" in their treatment approach, and the term "biopsychiatry" seems terminology of a minority opinion. As pointed out above there are clear examples of direct physical events causing psychiatric changes (but also of overwhelming psycho-social trauma also having psychiatric effects). But asking whether a field of medicine as a whole has a single cause/approach seems daft - lets take something clearly physical, namely a twisted ankle. Is this a bio-traumatic model ? Of course, we don't subscribe to the "uneven pavement (US=sidewalk) stone God" being angered at us stepping on it and in revenge striking down the trespasser's offending foot. Yet neither would any orthopaedic/trauma-medicine/GP doctor agree that bio-trauma exclusively describes a patient's overall experience (i.e. twist any number of anaesthetised animal's ankles and record time to resolution of swelling, does not map 1-to-1 with clinical scenarios). People differ in their pain tolerance, need for pain relief, response to any given analgesic, ability (physical, temperament, external factors) to appropriately rest or then re-exercise the ankle, social factors such as affordable time off work or need run-about after ones children to look after them. Indeed one can also add quality of advice and instruction from their doctor or physiotherapist, or indeed family & friends that the patient will also interact with.

So ask the question "does bio-trauma explain ankle injury" and the answer will be 100% doctors, but ask the question "does bio-trauma on its own explain totally (i.e. predict) single patient's precise clinical course" and the answer would probably be 0%. Of course the final outcome needs very lateral thinking to also embrace whether a patient will write and complain, instruct a solicitor, likely outcome of legal action and how much councils spend on municipal repairs to prevent injuries in general from ever happening. None of this though would resolve an attack on conventional medicine for not recognising the role for say reflexology as a valid treatment modality for a twisted ankle, and the resulting "anti-biotrauma" would be pointless in raising the question "Is the majority viewpoint of the medical profession, and particularly of the orthopaedic research community, that the biotrauma model of pavement injuries is, by and large, accepted or rejected?" - it should be self-evident that most doctors follow a scientific basis for understanding the underlying principles, with physiological model in approach at conversing and advising their patients to facilitate the optimised communication and best patient concordance for the problem, and all under a sociological framework which dictates limited resources (not all ankle sprains irrespective of mildness can warrant the time and cost of an MRI scan, nor supply of a physiotherapist living 24/7 in a patient's home to offer best guidance, nor expect return to work to not be influenced at all by pressures from work or financial needs).

Just as no orthopaedic doctor or physiotherapist would ever self-refer using the made-up term of "biotraumatist", yet we understand that there is an underlying acceptance of biological-trauma to their work. The problem with the question is twofold:

It seeks self-labelling to a single concept as proof of total working approach (compare say "does belief in Judaism make for a good religious leader ?" Whilst the belief is required for a religious leader in a Jewish community, clearly there are shared additional qualities of compassion, counselling (marital, bereavement, post-trauma) and social support to link in with social services or charity organisations that will be true for a religious leader of any particular belief). In other words the question has a flaw of logic in seeking to use an answer to a specific to explain a generalisation.

The choice of term "biopsychiatry", which at least in the UK, is not a term used. The term "biopsychiatry" is (again in UK at least) itself hopelessly POV by the anti-psychiatry movement. This is similar to Pro-Life (vs. anti-abortionists) & Pro-choice (vs. abortionists) choice of phrasing - on each side of this issue one term is that which a viewpoint self-identifies, the other is how the opponents categorise (see Pro-life#Term controversy). Wikipedia's decision in such situations to use the non-pejorative terms that a particular viewpoint self-identifies with; likewise whilst clearly the majority of the world's population do not adhere to Scientology (it is de facto not the major belief system in the world) and in many countries not recognised as a religion, nevertheless Scientology being non-trivial warrants its own article under WP:N and the article starts its description as "Scientology is a body of beliefs and related practices..."; which is how Scientologists, and not its opponents, would self-identify.

So on a similar vein most conventional doctors would not agree they are "allopaths" (indeed in UK I suspect few doctors ever heard this term), yet allopathy is term applied by non-conventional medicine (mostly homeopathy I believe) to them. To again rephrase the question "Is the majority viewpoint of the medical profession, and particularly of the clinical medicine research community, that the allopathy model of disease is, by and large, accepted or rejected?" is a meaningless question - most (UK) doctors in their ignorance would not self-identify as allopaths, and of those that do know of the term, the majority would still not self-describe with this term.

Returning to psychiatry, here in UK I would more recognise "psychopharmaeutical" as an approach at treating say severe depression (ie giving of drugs rather than prolonged psychotherapy analysis). Yet no psychiatrist would ever exclusively think that alone resolves severe suicidal depression for a patient who also has undergone a number of recent bereavements, has long term unemployment, has as a refugee limited English language and UK social-networking, has unruly children, an alcoholic abusive partner and issues from a neglected upbringing - but these issues do not detract from whether most psychiatrists might not at least consider a partial role for say Prozac for such a patient whilst a more multidisciplinary team approach can be set up and have its influence over the coming months or years.

So do most UK Psychiatrists mostly follow a biopsychiatric model - yes, but it is only part of their approach. Do most UK Psychiatrists class themselves under the specific term "biopsychiatry", I doubt it, yet their practice is rooted in biopsychiatry. The question remains naive, attempts to over-simplify a whole therapeutic discipline and uses a term the profession itself does not largely self-identify with. David RubenTalk 03:21, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree that the question is naive and demonstrates an ignorance of the state of the profession. The biopsychiatric model of psychiatry is neither accepted nor rejected by the majority of psychiatric professionals. It is a small part of the whole of their approach. The question is similar to asking if physicians, by and large, accept or reject holistic medicine. First, it would be impossible to determine. Second, the medical research community has a tendency to explore only a narrow range of inquiry. The medical community, on the whole, supports a variety of approaches and chooses interventions based on the efficacy of the particular treatment with the particular patient. On the whole, I find Hrafn's take on WP:UNDUE to be idiosyncratic and counter-productive. His rude persistance in following this peculiar interpretation and enforcing his viewpoint is simply disruptive. I would encourage him to take a break and come back with fresh eyes. Ursasapien(talk) 06:58, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your input Ursasapien. If the naiveté of my question offends you, then I apologise. However, as it seems to have yielded relevant and nuanced responses, it would seem to have achieved its aim. The bulk of responses, including their own, appear (and I apologise in advance if my summary is naive or otherwise inaccurate) to express a middle ground: that a 'biopsychiatric model' is neither endorsed over all other models nor rejected outright. If this consensus renders "idiosyncratic" my earlier objections, on the grounds of WP:UNDUE, to the article being almost solely written from, and sourced to those of, a viewpoint rejecting biopsychiatry, then I am happy to wallow in my idiosyncrasy. HrafnTalkStalk 08:08, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

A great source

I found an online version of this paper entitled "The biopsychosocial model in Anglo-American psychiatry: Past, present and future?". It can be found here and it contains tons of relevant material. I find it to raise all the issues that I've heard over the years. However, it does suggest we should broaden the scope of this article and/or the relation to other articles. I think a NEW article called "controversies in psychiatry" would be a good article, whereas the Biopsychiatry Controversy could be a subtopic which might be expanded into its own article (and given the material this article had earlier I think this is plausible). --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 21:28, 6 January 2008 (UTC)

New 'Focus on biochemical factors' section

Although, by and large, I do not object to the general thrust of this section, I do most emphatically object to the poor sourcing of it. I could have, under WP:V, simply have reverted the whole section. However this would have been taken as a provocative act, and would have been counter-productive in the longer term. I have therefore decided to hold fire, for now, and merely heavily tag the section. However if these deficiencies are not quickly remedied, or if further poorly-sourced material is introduced before this happens, I will hone more closely to WP:V. Specific issues:

As the first sentence is otherwise unsourced, it needs to stay very close to chemical imbalance theory (and effectively 'ride the coattails' of that article's sourcing), so I have replaced it with language taken directly from that article. If the original wording is demanded, it requires independent sourcing.

Breggin's unreliability has previously been discussed and is heavily documented on the article on him.

The 'Pharmaceutical industry influence' paragraph is only tenuously related, so I've moved it into its own section-stub (as we were discussing a section on this in any case).

I will close by quoting the main point of WP:V: "The threshold for inclusion in Wikipedia is verifiability, not truth." (emphasis in original) It does not matter what you 'know' to be the truth (or even if I agree with you that it is true), it only matters what we can verify with reliable sources. Please keep this in mind when (re)introducing content. HrafnTalkStalk 04:11, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for some of the language edit. But the source given at the end of the section states all the claims that you ask for citations. I will thus remove these unless you object. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 12:47, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I do object. Elliot Valenstein is clearly a partisan, if expert, source -- acceptable for sourcing the anti-biopsychiatry viewpoint, with attribution, but not for characterising the biopsychiatry viewpoint. Please source such statements to neutral sources. HrafnTalkStalk 13:35, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

That you consider him to be partisan is irrelevant as long as it is properly attributed. I don't see what you object to; the claims that psychiatrist are partial to the chemical balance theory is reflected in ie. Monoamine Hypothesis and is the reason many use medicines in the first place. Are you really claiming the unsourced statements are POV? It is also a viewpoint raised in the Biopsychiatry article. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 13:44, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Partisanship isrelevant, when you cite a source who explicitly rejects the psychiatric mainstream for what "Psychiatrists claim..." If these statements are indeed mainstream psychiatric views, then it should be easy to find mainstream sources for them. I would note that Monoamine Hypothesis is not much longer than your section, but cites 'five different sources for, I suspect, a less controversial topic.HrafnTalkStalk 15:06, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I see your concern. The article cited below at least establishes that the medical industry promotes the chemical imbalance theory and cites how there is little to no evidence for this theory. However it doesn't attribute it to psychiatrists. I don't possess enough wiki-fu to work in references yet, but it might be changed to "The pharmacological industry promotes ..." and use the article as a reference. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 14:54, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

this article claims "For many years, mental health professionals have used the term "chemical imbalance" to explain the need for medications that are used to treat mental health conditions. This simple and commonly used explanation recognizes that the condition is a medical problem and that it can be treated with medication. The "chemical imbalance" explanation also reflects the overall theme of treatment – identifying what neurotransmitters are involved in the clinical symptom picture and with medication, attempting to return that neurotransmitter level back to the "normal range".". Is this an RS? --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 15:07, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Is this better? I removed the sentence about medicines effaciacy since the article below has references on research that goes more deeply and can explain the findings that contradict the chemical imbalance theory. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 15:26, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

this article states "Contemporary neuroscience research has failed to confirm any serotonergic lesion in any mental disorder, and has in fact provided significant counterevidence to the explanation of a simple neurotransmitter deficiency. Modern neuroscience has instead shown that the brain is vastly complex and poorly understood". --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 13:54, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm trying to put together a coherent picture of all this, but not succeeding. I think the issue is highly complex and conflicted. According to the Chemical imbalance & Monoamine Hypothesis articles (and their voluminous citations), these hypotheses are known to be flawed, but continue to be employed in practice, because no superior hypothesis has been developed (and an imperfect explanation is better than none at all). According to the PLoS article, the disconnect lies between the scientific literature and the drug company's advertising. According to a follow-up article that Chemical imbalance cites, a prominent psychopharmacologic expert agrees and calls the chemical imbalance story a "useful metaphor", but one that he would not himself employ. Finally, we have a lone professional on a populist mental health site giving what appears to be whole-hearted support for the hypothesis. From this I would conclude that attempting to characterise the psychiatric profession's view on the chemical imbalance hypothesis is problematic, and should not be attempted except on the basis of a range of authoritative sources. HrafnTalkStalk 15:46, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

It is in fact highly likely that psychiatrists say a wide range of things, depending on how well-read they are, how lazy (and thus willing to take drug company claims at face value), whether they're talking to fellow professionals or attempting to simplify so that their patients can understand, etc, etc. It may be dangerous to attempt to distil this diversity down to a single stated position. HrafnTalkStalk 15:52, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, it is an interesting problem. I have found a lot of specialists referring to the theory, and even the primary papers. But interestingly the flaw are also pointed out in the primary papers as well! It is as if this is something a text book author invented; a professional myth. I found this paper which outlines the rise of the theory, but attacks the way media, the industry and some professionals portrays it because the science says something wholly different. I will study this paper and references and perhaps we can arrive at something that will portray the criticism from a wholly different angle, and add criticism from a different source allowing us to rewrite the whole paragraph. Ie. both the setup and dismissal of the myth. Agree? --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 15:56, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Agree with attributing the statement to Carver. The article states above says that Nancy C. Andreasen is a proponent of the chemical imbalance theory, but I cannot find any primary sources supporting this. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 16:07, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Andreasen would be an excellent source -- just be careful to amend the section to what she says rather than vice versa. Also the article on her is an excellent example of how not to write an article -- badly sourced (no sources other than herslef), badly laid out (no sections) and more than a little hagiographical. HrafnTalkStalk 16:33, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Benjaminbruheim: stating that "psychiatrists state" things on the basis of what a single non-psychiatrist says (when he doesn't even mention half the things you are attributing to him -- specifically the personality disorder half) is exactly the sort of thing that WP:V is attempting to ensure that wikipedia avoids. Please be more careful in future. HrafnTalkStalk 16:23, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, I was going to attribute that more precisely since I was concerned for that myself but forgot. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 17:20, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Incidentally, I suspect that the Valenstein statement needs more in the way of specifics (substantiation, clarification and/or qualification of what he's talking about) in order for him not to come across as some sort of out-of-touch voice-from-the-wilderness. 16:56, 7 January 2008 (UTC) HrafnTalkStalk 17:12, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree. Too bad Cesar Tort is no longer watching this article, he could probably help with that. I will look into it, or find other sources that raise the same issues. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 17:20, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

Added some more. I am not too happy with the attributions, but it is getting more and more clear that the hypothesis has little concrete evidence. However, all references to this hypothesis having support in, or at least affecting, psychiatry is often mentioned but never cited. Frustrating. I'm also unhappy with the formatting. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 21:15, 7 January 2008 (UTC)

I am likewise unhappy with the attribution -- it is to an "essay", an explicit "opinion piece", with no real authority beyond what the individual authors might command. Further, it provides no citation to the research literature for the first and most important point you attribute to it, "science has not established an ideal chemical balance of serotonin, nor a pathological imbalance" -- possibly because the authors would have difficulty finding one. This sort of statement should be cited to a good review article -- one that thoroughly surveys the current state of research. It is generally better to find good sources first, then write, as this helps avoid accidentally misrepresenting them through preconceptions and a natural tendency to think that the source "sort of says what I said, so will be okay as a source for it", while overlooking discrepancies between your and their position. I'll give you a chance to repair it (and may do some copyediting myself to alleviate some of the worst problems with using such a source), but really it's not the sort of thing that gives either wikipedia, or your own viewpoint, a good name. HrafnTalkStalk 03:51, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

Further on what authority "the individual authors might command", Jonathan Leo appears to be a partisan and a scientific lightweight. He is editor of Ethical Human Sciences and Services, the journal of Breggin's International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology, and his "selected publications" lists only an article in this journal, a chapter in a book explicitly presenting "current controversial issues in a debate-style format" and a journal "dedicated to the interdisciplinary approach within psychology and related fields". What I could find on him on Google Scholar isn't much more substantial. Jeffrey Lacasse's highest qualification is a master's in social work. If you are going to cite an entire paragraph to a single (or single pair of) author(s), please check out their qualifications, background and publication record first. HrafnTalkStalk 04:54, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

That is no proof that this source is unserious. The papers are cited 37 times and 27 times which is much higher than most papers. Now you're just getting tendentious and letting your subjectivity interfere. Try better than that. I might even reword your apologectic wording. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 11:06, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry you feel that way Benjaminbruheim. I scratched around further in L&L and found the references underlying their claims. One was to just the sort of thorough review article I had been demanding above. So I've put it in the first sentence, with some briefer, punchier wording, and a lengthy quotation from the abstract in the citation to back it up (in case of controversy). Incidentally, Google Scholar lists 152 citations of it -- slightly higher than L&L's 27. HrafnTalkStalk 13:29, 8 January 2008 (UTC) (Strictly speaking it's a "reanalysis" not a "review article", but lets not quibble. HrafnTalkStalk 13:58, 8 January 2008 (UTC) )

Excellent. I will try to find the original sourcing for the statement that efficacy of the medicine is by no means a proof of the chemical balance hypothesis, and thus establishing the reasoning L&L used. Then we will probably have sourced that section well enough. From a cursory review it seems that the L&L papers did have a profound impact around the world, even if they are indeed very critical against the psychiatric orthodoxy. But this is after all the spirit of science. :) I am not able to find any heavy criticism of their science so the unreliable tag is unwarranted though. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 00:36, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I'd suggest putting anything more into a new paragraph. The starkness of the disparity of what the medical facts show, versus what the drug companies say, works best without theoretical considerations confusing the reader: 'Fact: it doesn't, drug companies say it does.' <new paragraph> 'Further, [theoretical shakiness...]'. Don't let a desire to cover everything at once get in the way of making a clear, concise and easily understood point for the reader. On a side matter, could you explain why you inserted "alone" into the article? It adds the impression that antidepressants, when used in combination with other treatments, have a greater than "minimal" effect. This may be true, but I would prefer not to give this impression unless and until we can verify and cite it. HrafnTalkStalk 02:42, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

I understand. I think the change will make it clearer however. :) I inserted "alone" for two reasons, but I see your objection. I will revert it. I can however find sources that do show that medicines in combination with other treatment is notably better than treatment alone (or medicines alone), however it is unclear wether this is considered in the source. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 02:52, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

What's an APA quote doing here?

Given that Biopsychiatry controversy is a POV fork of Biopsychiatry, reserved for putatively a small minority opinion (as stated in the lead), it seems like a quote from the APA about the limitations of biopsychiatry does not belong here. Rather, it would seem to belong in some section about the (non-controversial) limitations of biopsychiatry in the parent article. 70.15.116.59 (talk) 16:06, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

POV-forks are against wikipedia policy, so it is hardly a compelling argument for removal of a quote that its presence is inconsistent with such a fork. In any case, a (rather heavily cherry-picked) version of this quotation has long been in the article. HrafnTalkStalk 17:04, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

The APA quote does admit that there are limitations to the biological model. I do agree, however Hrafn felt that was NPOV to selectively quote that. Perhaps the more recent APA statement is more relevant. Also, this is not a POV-Fork, it is about a tangible topic that is not relevant to the mother biopsychiatry article. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 22:08, 8 January 2008 (UTC)

I agree on the preferability of a more recent one, and had thoughts in that direction when I tracked down a less 'highlighted' version of the original. However, it may be difficult to find as the APA does not appear to have them on their site. It is also possible that there isn't a more recent one. The APA probably releases them 'as and when needed' (e.g. when a major development has occured or when the issue gets major media attention) rather than on a regular basis. If anybody can put their hands on a more recent one it would be very welcome. HrafnTalkStalk 03:16, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

"One of the charges against psychiatry that was discussed in the resultant media coverage is that many patients are being prescribed the wrong drugs or drugs they don't need. These charges are true, but it is not psychiatry's fault—it is the fault of the broken health care system that the United States appears to be willing to endure. As we address these Big Pharma issues, we must examine the fact that as a profession, we have allowed the biopsychosocial model to become the bio-bio-bio model. In a time of economic constraint, a "pill and an appointment" has dominated treatment. We must work hard to end this situation and get involved in advocacy to reform our health care system from the bottom up."

This might help making the article reflect the mainstream view. To the original remark, the criticism against bio-psychiatry is fairly widespread and recognized, and the above quote might reflect this. I suspect that we soon will be able to document that this has lead to changes in practice in mental health care (and in lesser degree in psychiatry) in a manner that it will probably be relevant to the parent article(s). This is after all a moving target and a lot has happened the last few years. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 03:34, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

This editorial is good, but really belongs in the 'Pharmaceutical industry influence' section.

I particularly like the sentence "In a time of economic constraint, a 'pill and an appointment' has dominated treatment." -- its a very concise summation that needs to be prominently quoted, but I don't know that we have a section for it to go into as yet. Perhaps the 'Pharmaceutical industry influence' section, perhaps an umbrella section over it on economic issues more generally.

I have a suspicion that the 'Fact: it doesn't, drug companies say it does' sentence may end up fitting in better in the 'Pharmaceutical industry influence' section as well (but the article's structure is still insufficiently solidified to say for sure).

New Lead

Okay, I rewrote the lead to be more "up to date". I need stuff to fudge the claims, whilst some might be fixed by summarizing it in a different way. But any help is appreciated. --Benjaminbruheim (talk) 14:21, 12 January 2008 (UTC)